Sunday, December 13, 2009

Week 33, Day 234, December 13, 2009 Memory Icons



We decorated our Christmas Tree today.  My wife always asks me to put a lot of lights on the tree, and every year I have failed.  I think I finally succeeded this year, and put all of our lights on the tree.  We had to purchase more lights to be able to finish the tree.  She was right, more lights is much more interesting.

After the lights, we begin decorating the tree.  Each ornament brings back a flood of memories.  I think especially this year now that two of our children are no longer living at home.

When I was younger, and the children would bring home hand made decorations from school we would put them on the tree.  I always thought that some day in the future we would them out, and just put up our most artistically pleasing ornaments.  Today those hand made ornaments mean more to me then any of the expensive purchased items.  They contain something much bigger.  They contain the wonderful memories of Christmas that they made them.

What are some of your favorite holiday decorations?

Lessons Learned:
  • Our house is very old, and every movement causes all of the decorations to move.  This shot was difficult to get a clear shot.  Lighting and White Balance is also tricky.  I tried all sorts of settings.  I was able to manipulate the White Balance so the reindeer and the trees look good, but the lights are now too blue.
 Photo details: Exposure time 1/10 sec, Aperture f/1.8, ISO 100, Focal Length 50 mm, 35 mm equivalent focal length 82mm, Lens Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II, tripod.

6 comments:

Andrew said...

Fun shot! I love shooting tree ornaments, they make for interesting macros.

I think you could possibly compromise on ISO. Especially since you're using an SLR, bumping it up to 200 wouldn't be noticeable, and it might buy you the faster shutter speed you want.

Also, if you want to change the light temperature on just the ornament, then open it up in Photoshop as a JPEG, zoom in, carefully select the reindeer with your selection tool of choice (I'm partial to the polygonal lasso, but I'm sure many folks will tell you to use a paintbrush in quick mask mode), and play with the levels from there.

Rune Eide said...

I was very partial to that wooden Santa - it reminds of home :-)Re the ISO problem: Modern SLRs can boost the the ISO quite considerably before noise is a problem. Also, If you shoot RAW, you adjust the colour balance after the shot and can play around with it as much as you like.

Yolanda said...

I like the composition, and the bokeh, even if they are blue - they look cool!

James said...

Cool picture. I really like the look of the lights in the background.

ruma said...

It is the lovely reindeer which seems to be slightly unstable so that Santa Claus gets.

Wonderful light will let you amplify happiness.

Greetings.

AB said...

Nice bokeh shot with the lights. The peg reindeer is just totally wonderful.