The Evolution of Chuckanucka in a Tree (Exposure Lock Homework)
Original RAW Image
This is how this photo looked straight out of the camera in its RAW format.
Auto Focus Position Screen Grab
Auto focus point screen grab from the Canon Digital Photo Professional software.
End Result Image
ASSIGNMENT
Make a few pictures of your subject using exposure lock from something brighter than your subject, and then a few using exposure lock from something darker than your subject.
WHAT I DID
This assignment offered the added challenge of photographing ugly things and I’ve been racking my brains trying to come up with ugly things to photograph. I was hoping to get to the city and perhaps take photos of dumpsters or graffiti but that was not to be, I never made it into the city this weekend. So I’ve been trying to come up with creative ugly instead. Yesterday’s photos featured my husband’s World of Warcraft Druid hanging out in the snow and in my front yard tree. They’re good but I’m not quite sure they’re “ugly” enough.
I awoke in the middle of the night with the realization that I have a basket of monsters living on my living room floor and in that basket is an Ugly Doll named Chuckanucka. So at about 6am I got up before sunrise and took photos of Chuckanucka in my still up Christmas tree. What? Not everyone leaves their tree up all year and decorates it for different seasons?
This is the original RAW format photo after I opened it in Gimp and corrected the over exposure and restored the positive and negative EV.
I used my macro lens to take this photo. I took it using the Aperture Priority setting with the aperture set to f2.8, the shutter speed at 1/5 and the ISO at 3200.
I was going for using the exposure lock to go from one light source to the next. I think I was trying to go from lighter to darker, but I am not sure. As you can see from the Ugly Auto Focus Point image, the point of the auto focus is just below the bottom of Chuckanucka’s right eye and to the right of the center of Chuckanucka’s body.
I think I like the softer colors and softer focus of the uncorrected RAW image more than I like the harsher tones in this corrected photo. But at the same time I like the shadow on Chuckanucka’s face and the Christmas lights showing up in more detail in this image.