Greenscreen? I think not! Its just magic...

So this past weekend I was up at Anime Odyssey in San Antonio and I had a photography booth set up where they could choose their own background. Now I did not use a green screen because one it is too much hassle and two it takes more lights than I personally have to light it correctly, and three spillage, where the green reflects up on the subject. So instead of greenscreen I used white and photoshop.

The biggest challenge I faced was just the fact that I wasn't able to steam my backdrop so there were creases in it but other than that it was pretty easy to pull them out of  the image.

The first step was obviously setting up my lighting, I used my cowboy studio remote flash system, and umbrella setup from Polaroid which I cant remember off the top of my head how much I paid but it wasn't much and it worked quite well. My flashes were set on manual at 1/8 power, my camera was set on shutter 1/250, f-stop was around 13 and my ISO was at 250. The lights were on either side of me a little higher than my head. Also the umbrellas are actually a key part of the setup it is near impossible to set up without the umbrellas or possibly a soft box if you are shooting with speed lights like I was. I went for a more even lighting for each image because it would make it easier to make them work in the backgrounds because I could manipulate the lighting in phoptoshop.





Next was the photoshop work itself, I let them pose themselves because I am not an expert on each character that they were dressed in so I didn't want to pose them in the wrong pose :/ so I took 3 poses and exported them straight to my computer as I was shooting so they could see the picture and make sure they weren't making a derpy face.

So once I finished with them I got to work in photoshop. What I use is the quick selection tool in photoshop and select them making sure anything with white is not in the selection. Next I go into refine edge witch is in the upper part of the screen usually about center. Once in there I will usually change the view mode to On Black so I can see if there is a white halo around them and usually there is. Next I check the smart radius option and change the radius to around 2.1, next I change the smoothness this mostly depends on if your subject has more curves or more harsh edges but I usually don't go over 15, next is the feathering that I dont go over 3 because it makes the edges too soft, contrast is usually around 6, and I shift my edge to around -7 this usually gets rid of the white halo, you can shift it in further if you need this is based on what you think looks good but usually -7 is where I put it.



The next part is a bit more complicated because sometimes it works for me and sometimes it doesn't but you will click the little brush on in the screen so that when you mouse over the image it have a circle with a + in it. You will use this to paint the edges like hair and such. When you click and drag like you are painting it will start to look like this then once you let go it will think and it will add in the hair and take out the white.

Once you are done doing the edges I recommend outputting it to a new layer with a layer mask because with the layer mask you will be able to add anything that you might have accidentally missed.


Once you finish and hit OK it will look like this:

From here you make make any other edits by using the layer mask which is the black and white image that is right next to the preview of the image that you are on in the layer mask. To get to this you just click on the black and white part and you are now working in the layer mask. With this you will use your paint brush and white will add to it and black will take away so if you accidentally missed selecting a part of the shirt or something then you just add it here. Once you are satisfied then you can drop in a background.

 Once you ad a background you are going to want to add a layer of a filter so that your subject and the background are the same hue so if its outside you will want the subject to match the warmth of the image or if its inside you will want it to match the lightness or darkness of the background image. I have a couple actions on my computer that I used to make this possible and easier. This part it the hardest to make it seem like it is part of the background, if you already know what the background is going to be the lighting can help but since everyone chose the background they wanted it would vary so it was easier for me to shoot it with even lighting and fix it up in photoshop. All together it took about 10-15 minutes per image to edit them.

Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial if you have any questions feel free to ask me here or on my facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sixtysixphotography

Pikachus First Time Out of Country

So today I don't have any amazing photoshoot to bring to you, and no one else in my family has gotten married so today I bring you the story of Pikachu on the cruise!

Our first stop brings us to Costa Maya. Pikachu stepped off of the boat in awe of the beautiful blue water and loved the feeling of the sun beating down on his head (When he wasn't in the camera case...)

He stopped and took pictures with the fountain they had there in the center of the little shopping district.

 He also climbed inside a cheetahs mouth, but was too afraid to take a picture with the live lion...chicken...

Then his favorite part of the cruise alcohol! He drank some local beer along with his friend HPV.

He had a few too many to drink at lunch.

Next he decided to relax out by the water and try to get a tan.

Now we hop on over to Belieze! Pikachu had a local mixed drink here.

Or rather 2... 

Pikachu learned to share with his friend syphilis! 

Now its time to relax by the pool! 

After those drinks I don't know if it is a good idea to be sitting on a hammock... 

Looks like hes still good... either that or he fell of quite a few times before I was able to snap this picture of him... He really doesn't know his alcohol limit

On the walk back to the bus to take us back to port he had to stop a couple times due to tripping on this bridge made of the trees that grow in the area...

Syphilis tried to warn Pikachu not to drink so much...

Pikachu can't sit up on his own without help... Waiting of the bus to go back to the ship.

Now in Roatan, Pikachu didn't take pictures with the monkeys and birds for fear of being pooped on and getting kidnapped by the monkeys. But he did enjoy he pictures I brought back. He just hung out in a tree with his good friend herpes. 

Still hangin'

Pikachu wanted to try a local beer but there were just so many... so he tried them all...

Then a nice relaxing time on the beach while I went out and played in the ocean.

He fell asleep in the sun good thing he doesn't sunburn... we think...

We got back to port for some shopping and he managed to get another beer from a nice lady in a jewelry store... Herpes was trying to get him to drink water but Pikachu was having none of that.

He made it back on the boat safe after all those drinks, and made his way over to Cozumel where we learned to make our own Margaritas and salsa! Pikachu wasted no time in getting the margarita they handed us at the door.

Some liquid courage? Maybe its because they gave me a knife...

Now chlamydia is the drunk! Pikachu had to help him out of the cup...

Pikachu made his first margarita and it was yummy! More please!

We learned how to make guacamole! Of course Pikachu and I are wimps and we made nice non hot guacamole and salsa.

Pikachus favorite salsa, the dessert salsa! Probably because it has alcohol in it...

After all of that Pikachu realized he had STDs, he was just too drunk the entire cruise to notice so he tried to get rid of them with penicillin but it was too late he caught them all...

Whelp I hope you all were entertained with this lovely story of what Pikachu did on the cruise while I was off having fun. I'm pretty sure he is still sleeping of his hangover a month later... I dont think he spent a single moment of the cruise sober... oh well such is life!

Next week I should be back to normal with my regular photography posts since I have a convention this weekend and a possible shoot Monday that I am excited about! So until then :D

Wedding bells on a cruise!

I know I know, I missed last weeks blog post, I was thrown off my usual schedule since school was over... I promise I will get back on schedule! So I am finally posting pictures from Crystal and TJs wedding! This wedding has got to be one of the funner weddings that I have worked over the years, not just because they are my cousins but because it was on a cruise!


There are many different difficulties of working on a cruise and shooting a wedding, one is people, we amazingly didn't have much of a problem with this a lot of people were nice and realized what was going on and made sure they weren't in the background. The second major issue would be the weather because its not like you can just say oh we will just do it next week when the weather clears up because you wont be there next week! Lighting I honestly just worked with one of my SBs the entire time and the camera I used was my D7000. Outside during the ceremony I didn't use my flash at all the ambient light was enough but not overpowering we got real lucky on that one.

I spent my time before the wedding with the bride Crystal as she got her hair and makeup done. Obviously I have the usual pictures but some of my favorites are these. Unfortunately it started to rain for like 20 min right before we were about to go up so I wasn't able to do much on the balcony area due to it being wet and I really didn't want to mess up the dress up before hand.




Detail shots are one of my favorite things to do at a wedding because I feel that it really does help tell the wedding story and one of my standard shots is always of the rings, whats with the rings usually change from wedding to wedding depending on what is available for this one i used the sash from her wedding dress and the veil. I also used more ambient lighting in this shot which is why it has a more amber hue to it making it seem more summery.

 Outside where the ceremony was held it was a small ceremony so I didn't have to worry about pulling out any of my long lenses and was able to stay fairly close to capture everything. During a ceremony you always want to be on your toes to catch every little thing without taking a million pictures. If you aren't careful you will have a lot of pictures of them looking at each other and you might miss that cute smile or laugh when something happens.


The more you work weddings the better you get at telling when these moments will happen but nothing is exact because it will happen when you miss a shot here or there dont get discouraged we are human and we make mistakes, just learn from them. You can always recreate the first kiss or the ring exchange if you miss it the first time but the spontaneous things that are unscripted are harder to recreate. I got lucky and caught both the ring exchange (not shown) and the kiss (right).


Also be aware of your surroundings because you want to use them to your advantage. For example sunsets, they are probably one of the most romantic things nature can do on its own so utilize that if you are able. You usually will have to up your f-stop if you are wanting to catch the colors of a sunset better because it will make them darker and more rich. Also have fun and be artistic and don't be afraid to try something out we live in a digital age so you really are only wasting space on a memory card not money for film, just remember to learn from your trials, if something works well then use those settings again, or the pose which ever, but remember not all poses work for all people some can pull off a pose better than others.

One of the other reasons I loved working this wedding the pictures were fun to conduct like the one here to the right. This was immediately after the wedding before we had dinner on the main floor of the ship was this cafe and a floor above was this platform and each floor above had a balcony type thing that you could over look the platform so I went up one floor and shot from above to get this great view of the couple and their friends what came on the cruise to come to the wedding.

This one was just up a couple steps on the same level as the couple do it is less of an areal view. I fount this on the first day I was on the ship and immediately knew I wanted to shoot here. The wedding was held the first full day on the boat so the day we got on when we explored the boat I kept an eye out for good spots to shoot. I don't think I ever really stop working I made little mental notes everywhere I went.

Most poses were thought up by Crystal and TJ and I just staged the shot at got into the best position to capture what best represented what she wanted. A main thing about shooting a wedding is knowing what they want out of the pictures, if you know that you should be pretty set in how you can conduct the photoshoots. The last few pictures were taken at the end of the cruise on the last full day at sea we had so much fun because we didn't have to worry about the ceremony and we got lucky and no one was near us so I didn't have to worry about yelling at strangers, only family lol.

These are some of my favorite shots of the wedding but there are so many more I would love to show you all but I don't want to make this post super long and everyone lose interest. I will post more on my Facebook page when I get a chance, now that school is over I should have a little more time on my hands to do these things! I hope you like these pictures as much as I do! Till next time :D

Roatan need i say more?

So the next stop on the cruise was Roatan which is in Honduras. Can I just say wow! Roatan was by far my favorite port, I don't know if it was because it was beautiful there at the port or because of the excursion we went on. If you ever find yourself on a cruise and your stopping in Roatan I recommend doing the Gumbalimba park excursion(if it is available). The excursion took most of the day but was definitely worth it.



At the start of the excursion we all got on a bus and drove a good while till we got to the park along the bus ride we learned a little bit more about the island and about where we were going. They told us that we were going to want to rent a locker because when we went on our tour in the park and we got to the money area in the park they might steal our stuff! once we were there it was so beautiful it was full of beautiful plants and flowers I had never seen before and animals too!


The scenery there was so breathtaking it is hard for me to explain in words, everything just felt so tropical and natural I had never been anywhere like it before. The plants life had some that I recognized like hybiscus and palm trees but there were plenty that I didn't know.

 This tree was so spikey I couldn't resist, it made me want to climb it but I'm sure the spikes wouldnt hold me! The palm trees were one of the first thing to greet us when we got there.

Next up is the animals! First lets just talk about how huge the iguanas got over there! They were massive! the orange one was so huge I'm almost sure he couldn't move! Ok he was big not fat but still I think we would have been almost as tall as me well I guess that's not saying much seeing as I am already short! The iguanas would just roam about the park and hang out where ever they pleased and when they go hungry the amazing park people would have the lettuce out for them.

We made our way to the parrot area where we were greeted buy beautiful parrots and we even got to have them sit on your shoulders! We weren't warned ahead of time but apparently the parrots liked taking buttons off of shirts... When the parrot got on my dads shoulder the parrot immediately went for the top button of his shirt! There were a lot of parrots just lounging around so I snapped a couple shots off just so I could show you the beautiful creatures!

The monkeys were so cute! The one above was apparently in timeout because once he hugged you he wouldn't let go for 30 min! That didn't stop him from performing for us! He wanted all the attention in the area so he just made himself know. The monkey to the left was one of the ones that would sit on your shoulders. He was so cute and adorable! This pic was taken in between sitting on peoples shoulders, he posed for just a second before getting back up and begging to be on someone!

So these next two are other animals we encountered, the first one was rabbits! Yes you heard me right, those on the top are rabbits, they looked more like giant rats to me! The picture below it is one of a humming bird not moving his wings! Either the humming bird is lazy or we just got lucky. After we did the park thing we were driven to this resort where we got to go swim in the ocean! This was my first time all cruise in the crystal blue waters. There wasn't much of a difference except for the fact that you could see everything. One of the things that made me laugh was that there they were walking around selling things and the thing he was selling was a skydiving experience that was one dollar to go up and 64 to come back down.


These last couple of shots were from the boat at we were taking off, the water was so clear that you could just see right through it! I will go back one day!

So until next time enjoy!