Stevesc's 52 for 2017 - week 32, 33 & 34 added

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Welcome to my 52 project for 2017. I tried this last year but gave up after falling to far behind, hoping to get to the end this year.

One thing I realised from last year that it is impossible to comment on all the entries but I will do my best to comment on as many as I can.

Last year I pushed myself to take a few shots that I would never have done without the project and was really pleased with a few of them, hopefully I can do the same again this year.

Lastly, I gave myself a couple of jokers last year but realised that I either took a shot for the week on theme or didn't submit anything so this year I am not going to do any jokers but simply aim to complete each week (can't be that hard can it :eek:).

Week 0 - Song title
Week 1 - Order
Week 2 - Comfort
Week 3 - Hairy
Week 4 - Smooth
Week 5 - Mineral

Week 6 - Whole
Week 7 - Structure
Week 8 - Routine
Week 9 - Numbers
Week 10 - Attractive
Week 11 - Dark
Week 12 - Power
Week 13 - Above
Week 14 - Evolve
Week 15 - Hold
Week 16 - Smoke
Week 17 - Vivid
Week 18 - Large
Week 19 - Architecture + reshoot (Structure)
Week 20 - Broken
Week 21 - Transport

Week 22 - Minimalistic
Week 23 - Progress
Week 24 - Pleasure
Week 25 - Tiny
Week 26 - Face
Week 27 - Agriculture
Week 28 - Graceful

Week 29 - Fruit
Week 30 - Vehicle
Week 31 - Piece

Week 32 - Contrast
Week 33 - Clean(ed)
Week 34 - Curves
 
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Week 0 - Song Title

Jump around by House of Pain (or Jump Jump by Kris Kross):

After chatting with the kids and listening to a few songs they agreed to help me with this one down the park. It was a grey cloudy day so not the best light but decided I needed to get the shot anyway.

I was reasonably happy with this as a first shot for the 52 and liked the expressions on their faces and the movement in the shot, I would have liked more room above and to the left which I need to look out for in future. Editing wise I have cleaned it up a bit and worked a bit on the background and edited it colour wise to try and give it a bit of an album feel.

Any comments are welcome:

Jump around by Steve, on Flickr
 
Nice one, Steve. Jump Around is a personal favourite of mine and the shot ties in to that title very well. Love the colours, background and expressions. Only thing that would boost it a bit for me is the space as you've noted yourself, and the eye contact from the young lad (or lack of). The eye contact from your daughter is so much more engaging and really adds to the feel of the shot, for me anyway.

Looking forward to seeing your 52 this year :)
 
Well caught Steve - love the movement, facial expressions and even the graffiti in the bg.
 
Nice one, Steve. Jump Around is a personal favourite of mine and the shot ties in to that title very well. Love the colours, background and expressions. Only thing that would boost it a bit for me is the space as you've noted yourself, and the eye contact from the young lad (or lack of). The eye contact from your daughter is so much more engaging and really adds to the feel of the shot, for me anyway.

Looking forward to seeing your 52 this year :)

Thanks Ian, you right about the eye contact, hadn't thought of that and is something else to try and remember in future. Having said that, he hates his photo being taken so I'm still pretty happy for him to have even been in it.

A fantastic start to your challenge with this great action shot, I agree that there could be a little bit more room at the top and the eye contact from your daughter really makes the image.

Thanks Mandy, the room at the top is a pain, given better editing skills I would try and stretch it.

Nicely caught, on theme and they look like they are enjoying it.

Cheers Clive, they were indeed for a few minutes! Not there favourite thing to be photographed but they enjoyed the jumping around.

Well caught Steve - love the movement, facial expressions and even the graffiti in the bg.

Thanks Carl, I deliberately chose the background to give some interest rather than an empty green field of most of the rest of the park
 
Super start Steve and good luck for this year, I always make getting my photo in priority, and then comments follow if I have time.
You're off to a smashing start as the others have said, there's loads of movement there but you've managed to capture your daughters smile and flying hair perfectly. They look as if they really enjoyed themselves, well done :)
 
Welcome to my 52 project for 2017. I tried this last year but gave up after falling to far behind, hoping to get to the end this year.

One thing I realised from last year that it is impossible to comment on all the entries but I will do my best to comment on as many as I can.

Last year I pushed myself to take a few shots that I would never have done without the project and was really pleased with a few of them, hopefully I can do the same again this year.

Lastly, I gave myself a couple of jokers last year but realised that I either took a shot for the week on theme or didn't submit anything so this year I am not going to do any jokers but simply aim to complete each week (can't be that hard can it :eek:).

Week 0 - Song title
Well summed up Nick, the commenting is the biggest hurdle to get over 'mentally' not many people can comment on all, and some people worry themselves when they can't !!! - but in my opinion ALL should be able to comment on 1 or 2 a week as a minimum to keep the spirits high :)

Also good idea to keep out the Jokers, way too easy with them :LOL:

Song Title - Nice choice and a great bit of action captured, they appear to be enjoying it too - Good Start, and good luck with the rest of your 52 (y)
 
What's wrong with Jump by Van Halen?

Great timing with motion blur only on your kids' limbs but not on their faces. I like the background too, maybe a bit tightly cropped on the upper edge, but I assume that's where fence ends?
 
Hi, nice first submission.

I don't mind the BG, but I'd like a little separation with a shallower DOF.

Great to get kid's involved.

Cheers.
 
A very fun and happy shot, like it :)
Cheers David.

That's a lovely, colourful, happy shot Steve. I like the movement in the body but the sharper faces and the expressions as you say are great! (y)
Thanks (y)

Super start Steve and good luck for this year, I always make getting my photo in priority, and then comments follow if I have time.
You're off to a smashing start as the others have said, there's loads of movement there but you've managed to capture your daughters smile and flying hair perfectly. They look as if they really enjoyed themselves, well done :)
Thanks Susie, I felt bad last year when I couldn't comment on all the posts but have realised I need to be realistic and just do my best (but also not cop out and not do any).

Well summed up Nick, the commenting is the biggest hurdle to get over 'mentally' not many people can comment on all, and some people worry themselves when they can't !!! - but in my opinion ALL should be able to comment on 1 or 2 a week as a minimum to keep the spirits high :)

Also good idea to keep out the Jokers, way too easy with them :LOL:

Song Title - Nice choice and a great bit of action captured, they appear to be enjoying it too - Good Start, and good luck with the rest of your 52 (y)
Thanks, I found that the jokers made no difference for me, there wasn't one week when I posted anything off theme. It felt a bit pointless just to post a random photo that wasn't on theme....so all or nothing this year :). Thanks for the positive comments.

What's wrong with Jump by Van Halen?

Great timing with motion blur only on your kids' limbs but not on their faces. I like the background too, maybe a bit tightly cropped on the upper edge, but I assume that's where fence ends?
Nothing wrong with Van Halen :D The two titles listed were ones we found when we were looking for ideas. The background is actually the back of a skate ramp and above it was a fence, but the sky through it was just a blown grey so didn't want to include it.

Hi, nice first submission.

I don't mind the BG, but I'd like a little separation with a shallower DOF.

Great to get kid's involved.

Cheers.

Thanks, I often shoot at f1.8 but struggle to keep all the kids in focus when they are moving around so stopped down to f2.8, I agree though that a slightly shallow DOF would have been good.
 
I saw the shot and thought 'Jump Around' before I read the title, so it obviously works for the theme :)
Excellent capture of the expressions on their faces, which are sharply in focus whilst you've managed to also get motion blur on their feet. That must have been quite a difficult balancing act.
 
Nice mixture of motionless and blur, great to get the kids involved. I used my daughter a few times the last couple of times I tried.
 
I saw the shot and thought 'Jump Around' before I read the title, so it obviously works for the theme :)
Excellent capture of the expressions on their faces, which are sharply in focus whilst you've managed to also get motion blur on their feet. That must have been quite a difficult balancing act.
Thanks. Wish I could say it was a difficult balancing act and that I spent time achieving it, truth is I quickly set up and took about 7-8 shots trying to get their faces sharp as I felt that was the most important. The amount of movement was a lucky coincidence :D.

Nice mixture of motionless and blur, great to get the kids involved. I used my daughter a few times the last couple of times I tried.

Thanks, I enjoyed getting them involved last year as well and will include them when I can. Think they might get a bit annoyed with me if I ask them to often though.
 
Great image caught fantastic expressions on your kids faces works well for me
 
Running out of time for this week I decided to set something up at home last night.

I used a set of Russian dolls that we have and initially thought I would like to take an overhead shot using the shadows to show what the object was, so set up the dolls on a white surface and took this shot from above. Not having much time to set up lights this was taken under the kitchen lights and I found that I was limited to the shadows that I could get. I would have liked to use a smaller aperture but was limited by the shutter speed as I was hand holding these shots and the ISO on my camera sin't really usable much above 400. I did like the slightly abstract way this came out

#1
Order overhead by Steve, on Flickr

I then though I would try them face on with a black background. The first shot has the focus mid way down then dolls and the second shot has it on the first doll, I prefer the focus on the mid way shot but the front doll doesn't seem to stand out so well against the background as in the second shot. Also when shot I had shadows on the surface but the surface was rather grey so decided to edit to make it an even black, this then gives a feeling of them floating a bit, I'm not sure the best way to deal with this but will maybe look into some glass/mirror for future shots to give a reflection.

#2
Order 2 by Steve, on Flickr

#3
Order by Steve, on Flickr
 
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Good bit of experimentation Steve. I think the colours stand out more against the black bg and of those my fave is #2 as it forces the eye to travel more than the straight up and down #3 .... if you know what I mean !?!??!
 
#1 for me, a much more interesting perspective but I instantly knew what they were
 
The overhead shot for me an unusual angle not something I would of thought of but it works
 
All very good, Steve! Prefer 1 and 3 for me; shadows, perspective and DoF are all spot on. Well done.
 
The overhead shot works for me too Steve and you've got a few dust spots bottom left and right you could clone out.
 
Good bit of experimentation Steve. I think the colours stand out more against the black bg and of those my fave is #2 as it forces the eye to travel more than the straight up and down #3 .... if you know what I mean !?!??!
Thanks Carl, I know exactly what you mean...I like it for that reason.

Ooo I like them Steve, the black background ones are nice, but for me I much prefer the overhead shot, shadows look good to me, a not very usual angle for these, nice one (y)
#1 for me, a much more interesting perspective but I instantly knew what they were
The overhead shot for me an unusual angle not something I would of thought of but it works
All very good, Steve! Prefer 1 and 3 for me; shadows, perspective and DoF are all spot on. Well done.

Thanks all, I wasn't sure if it would be to abstract but pleased you all liked it.

The overhead shot works for me too Steve and you've got a few dust spots bottom left and right you could clone out.

Thanks, I'd totally missed those dust spots...really shouldn't edit as late as I did last night.
 
Love the over head shot. I'd try with a higher aperture and see how it looked. Nice work.
 
I really like the overhead shot with the shadows Steve - a really original pov. Your dolls look much better on black than mine did - I prefer the first of these for the same reason as Carl. I'm glad I wasn't the only one battling the Russian dolls this week :D
 
All good shots on theme, but it has to be the overhead shot as it is an abstract like shot :)
Thanks David, I quite like abstract images but I know there not to everyones taste, it's been good hearing that others like it as well.

Love the over head shot. I'd try with a higher aperture and see how it looked. Nice work.
Thanks, I did try with a higher aperture but due to low lighting there was too much noise at the ISO level needed. I should have set up a tripod for it but was short of time.

Interesting POV....just seen 2 and 3 and much prefer #3.

Great to try various compositions.

Cheers.

Thanks Andy, take it you weren't too keen on the overhead shot :) I had fun playing with different set ups but could have done with a bit more time to fine tune them.

I really like the overhead shot with the shadows Steve - a really original pov. Your dolls look much better on black than mine did - I prefer the first of these for the same reason as Carl. I'm glad I wasn't the only one battling the Russian dolls this week :D

Thanks Emma, they are a pain for reflections aren't they....I tried to get some side/back light on them but just gave up in the end as it was just giving blown highlights all over the place.
 
week 1 looks like you had fun setting up for them images, I am just not sure which image is working the best for me at the moment. I kind of want to say 1 of the images with the black BG but I feel there is a better shot to be had with the dolls.
 
Song title - Lovely shot I like that the faces are in focus but you have the motion blurr in the feet and arms.
Order - Good set of photos for the theme I like the over head shot with its unusal POV and nice shadows best. but the other two are good too, I can't decide which I prefer of them.
 
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