Barrett and Rachel, originally uploaded by mark.mortensen.

Had my very first engagement shoot a couple of weeks ago. I work with Barrett at my “real” job. Barrett and his fiancé Rachel are planning on getting married in Italy next year.

Taken at Wash Park in Denver, CO with a rented Canon 85mm f/1.2 @2.8 with a rented Canon 5D Mark II. My 5D Mark II was in the shop during this time getting its autofocus unit finally replaced. The 85mm f/1.2 is a sweet lens and might consider buying something of its caliper in the future. The focus is really sensitive but when its locked on its a wonderful look at f1.2. I’ve been having issues with autofocus working consistently on my 5D II and has prompted me to look at a Nikon D700. So far the D700 gives me more of want I want out of camera.

Technical Ramblings: Lightroom adjustments from the RAW image included exposure bump (2/3 stop my camera consistently underexposes) and sharpening. Photoshop CS3 and the Totally Rad Actions; Wish You Were Here… (pumps the green and blues), Prettyizer (pumps contrast, saturation and gives a bit of glow), Ying/Yang (lighten faces).

Uploaded by mark.mortensen on 25 May 09, 4.52PM MDT.

Dragon Fly, originally uploaded by mark.mortensen.

I got my Canon 5D Mark II back from repairs at Canon today so went out to take some images. Turns out Canon didn’t fix the autofocus issues I’m seeing but instead of giving me a call when they had the camera they just sent it back with a letter saying the camera is working as expected. Uhmm, not acquiring a focus lock is working as expected? Now I have to turn around and send it back AGAIN. Things like this make me want to switch vendors. Okay off my soap box for now.

This dragon fly ornament is in front of our house and I did more than my normal post work to get this image. Trying to create some “art” and wondering if I came close?

Technical Ramblings: This is captured with my Canon 50mm f/1.4 @ 1.4 to create the wickedly thin depth of field on the eye and wing tip. I’ve included the original image in the comments for reference. Post work in Lightroom included sharpening and a bit of cropping on the dragon fly. Post in Photoshop CS3 and the Totally Rad Actions included; Hue/Saturation layer (boost magenta of the eye and blue of the wing tip), Oh Snap!, SX-70, Claire-ify (50% opacity), Dirty Lovin (texture) and Dirty Diana (texture at 50% opacity and masked out the dragon fly).

Original image with Lightroom crop and sharpening before the Photoshop pixel punishing.

Uploaded by mark.mortensen on 8 May 09, 5.49PM MDT.

Rocking Chair, originally uploaded by mark.mortensen.

A rocking chair built by Cliff Whitehouse of Bernwood Custom Design. After I photographed Cliff’s kitchen he hired me back to photograph some of his furniture he has built. This chair weighed a ton.

Technical Ramblings: Two AlienBee B800s in large softboxes right and left of chair. I also have grids on the softboxes to narrow the spread of the light. This causes the white seamless paper to go gray in the background. The chair a good 6-8 feet in front of the paper. First time I had really shot a large product and it’s a lot harder than it looks to get everything right. Post work only in Lightroom included; contrast boost, saturation boost, vibrance boost, clarity boost and sharpening.

Uploaded by mark.mortensen on 7 May 09, 9.13PM MDT.

Kyle and Grace, originally uploaded by mark.mortensen.

One of many dramatic poses during my shoot with Kyle. They were trying to look like Edward and Bella from the movie Twilight. Kyle and Grace both graduate from high school this year. However, they don’t attend the same high school.

Technical Ramblings: Two AlienBee B800s bare shot at white seamless paper background. The background is about 10ft from Kyle and Grace. I built homemade barn doors out of white foam paper to stop the flash from flooding back to the camera. The other AlienBee B800 is in a large softbox camera left. I also have a silver reflector camera right to help fill the shadows because I don’t have a 4th bee (yet). Still trying to win the lottery so I can buy all the equipment I would like to get. Actually, paying jobs would help too. Post work in Lightroom; Exposure bump (2/3 stop up), sharpening, clone work on the skin and some CA adjustment. Post work in Photoshop CS3 and Totally Rad Actions; Took out Kyle’s knees as I found them distracting (see comment below), Oh Snap! (no defog layer), Pro Retouch (skin smoothing) and Good vs. Evil (Brighten the white background). I still need to work on getting my background whiter.

Uploaded by mark.mortensen on 2 May 09, 6.29PM MDT.

To give you an idea what can be done in post editing here’s the image straight out of camera. This image is before any Lightroom editing and only has the Camera Faithful profile applied during import and conversion to a DNG file. I make mistakes during the shoot and this image is under exposed and the white background isn’t really white.