Meet the Spruills

When I go into a photo session with a family, I try to incorporate something they like to do together. It can be either an outdoor or indoor activity. I actually prefer outdoors because it seems people aren't as "stuffy."

On the day of the Spruill family session, we were scheduled to shoot outdoors. But as I traveled to their home, the sky got darker and more ominous the closer I got to their home. By the time I parked in their driveway, the sky had opened up with a torrential downpour. It's a good thing my equipment was nicely packed... it stayed dry but I was soaked.

Rain or not, everybody was upbeat and ready to shoot. When plan A gets squashed, I shift gears for plan B. So I set up for an indoor shoot. As you can guess from the first photo, this is a football family. Sometimes when you shoot indoors, you have to move things. They really were great, and very accomodating. I had them rearranging furniture, clearing out space for my lights... but I made sure everything was back in order before I left.

Just as we were finishing up, low and behold, the rain stopped and the sun came out nice and bright. So I suggested we go out and get a few quick shots. I love when a plan comes together... even if it means weathering a storm first.

Rockets Red Glare

I'd never photographed fireworks before, so I decided this year would be the year. Originally, I thought of going over to Jersey City to shoot the Macy's fireworks, but I didn't really want to deal with the mega crowds or the train ride. So I did an online search and found a fireworks show close to home in Nutley, NJ, only a 10 minute drive away.

When shooting fireworks, some key things to keep in mind are: a tripod is a must; use a zoom lens to make zooming in or out easy if you need to; set the focus on manual, then adjust it to infinity and forget about it; set the ISO 100; select an aperture between f8 - f16. You will have to adjust the shutter speed a bit until you get it right. I shot most of my images at 2.5 seconds. Next time I might experiment with speeding up the shutter speed a tad bit. Oh, and the other tool I used was my wireless remote. Once I had the camera aimed in the right location, I didn't have to touch it again. This helped to minimize any shake from manually pressing the shutter.

My settings:
Exposure 2.5 sec
Aperture f/11.0
Focal Length 28 mm
ISO 100

Newark City Council Members

The Council Monitor, Winter 2009/2010Back in December, I had an opportunity to photo the Newark Municipal Council members for the cover of The Council Monitor. Though it was a pretty tight schedule, a few of the members stayed around and I shot individual portraits after we finished the group photo for the cover.

Central Ward Councilman Charles A. Bell, City of Newark, NJ

Councilman-At-Large Carlos M. Gonzalez, City of Newark, NJ

Councilman-At-Large Donald Payne Jr, City of Newark, NJ

West Ward Councilman Ronald C. Rice, City of Newark, NJ