My 2009 Progression

met

I bought my DSLR this year, so instead of doing a "best of" I decided to do a review of my progress instead.


1. Pre-2009 and beginning of the year. (An example of what I was doing with my Canon Powershot p&s)


2. May 2009. Started using my Nikon D80 on full Auto in JPG format. No post processing.



3. June 2009. Still using my D80 on full auto, but I bought an SB600 (not on camera for this picture though) and downloaded a trial version of Lightroom and started shooting in JPG+RAW. (I had no idea what I was doing in post.)





4. July 2009. Still shooting the same, but played around a bit with B&W conversions in Lightroom.



5. August 2009. Still playing around with my camera. Started switching between Auto and messing around with manual settings. The only pictures I really took were on vacation at our family cabin. Still practicing processing in Lightroom. In hindsight I saw the dust on the sensor, but at the time I was pretty pleased with this picture. (I need to revisit it to clean that up.) Also, finally figured out how to export pictures without using the Print Module in Lightroom.



6. September 2009. Shot a wedding for my friend as a favor. I didn't feel qualified at all, but I muddled through. Some shots I was happy with, others - not so much.



7. October 2009. A close friend of mine died of cancer and I barely picked up my camera.

8. November 2009. Did some serious reading on my camera settings, started shooting in full manual mode. Switched to shooting in RAW only, because I started figuring out processing. I borrowed a 50mm 1.8 from a friend and fell in love with the lens and natural light. Figured out that my main photographic joy is childrens portraiture. Did 5 sessions with my friend's kids and nieces and nephews in November. I'm still working on trying to get things tack sharp with this lens.

a. Zoey


b. Mac


c. Dillon


d. Devin


e. Gracie Lulu



9. December 2009. Did a take off of B.D. Colen's "A Day in Our Life" in a morning spent with my niece and nephew. Started practicing more photojournalistic style and practiced more with my B&W conversions.


10. January 2010. Started off the new year with a newborn shoot. My goals for 2010 are to learn more about studio and off camera lighting, get a pro smugmug site to start upcharging for prints and perhaps take on some paid children's portraits jobs.



Thanks for looking.

Trevlan

Your progression is great. Really love the map you've laid out. What I recommend you do is go to strobist.com and learn to light with small flashes from Dave. I picked up his DVD, it's very informative. Will you learn how to light everything? No, but you'll learn the concepts. From there, you can develop your own style of lighting and really give your images the quality of light they deserve. Keep up the good work.

CyberSteak

Love this photo!

VayCayMom

You are well on your way to meeting your next goals. I love this idea of showing your progress and the story behind each photo. Nice job !!! You made quite a bit of progress in many ways, congrats!!

toddb

thanks for sharing
Really enjoyed looking at the progression...and great progress throughout the year. Good luck in 2010 -- think you're well on you're way to making a little money at this. (love the shot of the girl peeking through the window).

divamum

Great progress, and great shots! You are well on your way. Thanks for sharing!

lilmomma

Nice progression, Molly! Hope 2010 brings a great year for you!

met

Thank you everyone for your kind comments. Dgrin has been great in helping me progress this past year. Not only getting feedback, but seeing everyone's awesome images has been an inspiration to keep learning and progressing. I definitely need to go through strobist. That's my first top in learning the basics of lighting.