Jonathon L. Jenkins (JLJFoto)
Sharing my passion for Photography through travel, reflections, flowers and photo wall art
Automagically!
A few months ago, while sitting in a restaurant in the city, I saw this bright red VM Bus drive by. I quickly got up to take a shot of it, but it was gone. Later, as it came back by the front of the restaurant, I quickly rushed outside to take a couple of quick shots while it was stopped at the corner.
Pentax K-7: Exposure: 1/40 sec at f/10, ISO 100, Lens: Sigma 18-50mm Macro @43mm
BTW, have any of you seen this Camera Simulator? I thought if was pretty cool! It’s not as good as getting out to shoot, but still a good learning/experimenting tool.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
An Evening view from South San Francisco, CA
I’ve been checking out the evening sky behind the hills in South San Francisco or “South City” for the last few weeks as I walked to my car. Well today,I decided to head to the top of the parking structure and take a few shots. These shots are the result of a few minutes of shooting…
This was my first view off of the top of the parking structure. The sky was beautiful and the lights on the hills catch my eye each evening…
Rotating the camera to the right, I caught a little more of the hills closer to me along with many more lights on the hill…
Rotating more to the right, I took this shot as a train went by in the foreground. I’ve been trying to figure out the best time to shoot this building, and I think I like it best during this time of day…
Here’s a closer shot of the building…for some reason this building reminds me of a Windows Home Server…
Well, I have a few more to share from my last Meetup. I’ll hopefully get to those in a few days.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
Antique Toys
I saw these antique toys sitting on a friend’s shelf and decided to take some macro shots to see how I would like them. The challenge was to isolate them so that each was in it’s own “scene” without having to do a lot of cropping and editing after the fact. I also wanted a shallow depth of field to catch some of the wooden shelf background, but not enough that it would be distracting and draw your eye away from each subject. The following shots are from a quick 10 minute “photo shoot” with the toys:
Well, that’s it for now. It was a good quick shoot and I liked the way they turned out. The lighting was great. Maybe I’ll try to shoot them in different light or outside sometime.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
Lions, Tigers and Bears! Oh My!
Well, no bears or tigers but there were lions!, but that’s title that came to mind…although this week, it could definitely be related to the baseball and football games I’ve checked out. The Detroit Lions against the Chicago Bears and the Detroit Tigers against the Texas Rangers…
Anyway, enough of that. I took some time off from work to vacation with my Mother and Sister in Florida last week and it was excellent to see them and spend time together. During that week, on Sunday October 2nd, was the Annual Scott Kelby World Wide Photowalk. I usually participate here in the San Francisco Bay Area, but since I was going to be in West Palm Beach, FL, I decided to see if there was anything photography related happening over there.
I have to say, YES there was! I met some really cool people AND was fortunate enough to take pictures at a local safari park. It was my first time at such a park, and I’d packed some long glass in anticipation (170-500mm) It turned out to a great day with lots of animals that I’d never seen before. It gave me a chance to check out the area and see what happens around there. I will definitely have to make it back over there for more shooting time.
This was my first shot just inside the fence of the reserve, shot from the driver’s seat of my car…
Yes, there WERE lions. There was quite a bit of protection between us and them. They were indeed wild and it was a pretty interesting experience being so close to them in the “heightened state of security”…
I liked this as a black and white portrait. I was so busy shooting, I didn’t do a very good job of understanding what the names of the animals I was shooting were. They gave each car a CD which is you were driving through at a regular pace (and not stopping as much as I was to take pictures) it would narrate the drive through the entire park. Since I (1) didn’t have my laptop to copy the disc to an .mp3 or (2) stop shooting early enough to get to the gift shop and buy one, I don’t actually know what all of the animal names are, but I still had a good time and enjoyed shooting in the park.
I tried to compose the shots to eliminate as much of the “hand of man” as possible. I wanted the resultant images to have the “feel” of being in the wild. After a while, I began to feel acclimated to the park and it was a pretty interesting and peaceful feeling. Maybe I do want to try a real safari some day…
The Rhinos and Zebras were pretty cool too…
And the Giraffes too!…How’s this for a portrait?
Well, that’s a few of the shots from my PBC Meetup/Scott Kelby Photowalk day, which also happened to be my birthday. It was a pretty good day and I managed to be shooting something new and fun as well as meeting cool new photographers while on vacation with my family.
It really couldn’t get much better than that.
I hope you enjoy these, I had a blast getting out and taking them.
Jonathon
Key Largo and all points South…
While on vacation a couple of weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to attend a meetup with the PBC Photo Walkers, I met some cool folks and one in particular, Art, who invited me to a nautical antiques company for a photo walk.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the morning turned to be incredible. First of all, the company is called Culpepper Nautical Antiques and I highly recommend stopping by if you are anywhere near the area. Of the many shots I took that morning, this is one of the first to be processed and it has already become one of my favorites of the day. I will share more as I process them.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Posted from my iPad
Portraits! Models! Studios! Kind of different from landscapes!
Even with my schedule being busy, I have still been fortunate enough to find time to get out and shoot. I haven’t had the time to post, but at least I’ve still been attempting to “see creatively,” learn more about photography and most importantly, just get out and shoot!
Well, I’ve bene able to spend a few time learning how to take better portraits. I have met some wonderful people through meetups where I have begun to learn and practice in the studio. I also attended a great meetup where I learned about shooting with multiple speedlights or external flashes. The keys, being about learning about light placement, how and where to place lights, Additionally, I’m beginning to learn more about posing and working with models to get the look/pose that I’m after. It has been an excellent few months.
So, with today’s post I wanted to share some images of the wonderful people that I have been fortunate enough to practice on and I’d like to thank them and several others who have been kind enough to pose for me.
I truly enjoyed the time and hope that we can spend more time together sometime soon…
This first image was shot at a workshop in San Francisco. It was good to check out a nice studio and also have the chance to shoot there.
Exposure: 1/250 at f/2.8 at ISO 100 – Pentax SMC 50-135mm at 135mm
This image was shot at a meetup in Redwood City hosted by Paul Grant Photography. The meetup was to learn about studio lighting and was fantastic. I got a chance to learn and meet wonderful people as well as shoot in a great studio.
Exposure: 1/25 at f/3.5 at ISO 100 – Pentax SMC 50-135mm at 135mm
This image was shot in my home studio. It was a great opportunity for me to do a shoot with my remote flash triggers and speedlights instead of the continuous “hot lights” that I’ve used in the past.
Exposure: 1/60 at f/4.5 at ISO 100 – Pentax FA 50mm f/1.4 at 50mm
This image is of Ginger and from a model shoot with Paul Grant in Redwood City. She is an experienced model and it was an amazing opportunity to be able to shoot her in the studio.
Exposure: 1/160 at f/6.3 at ISO 100 – Pentax SMC 50-135mm at 123mm
The final image is of Melissa and also from a meetup model shoot with Paul Grant in Redwood City. The theme of the workshop was 30’s and 40’s black and white images and I was quite plead with the results of the day. This is one of my favorites of the shoot.
Exposure: 1/125 at f/5.6 at ISO 100 – Pentax SMC 50-135mm at 70mm
Well, I hope this was a small glimpse into what I’ve been up to lately. I haven’t stopped shooting, just haven’t taken time to write and post. I hope you enjoy viewing these as much as I enjoyed learning to shoot them. Please let me know if you have any questions that I can help with or if you want to spend some time practicing with me in my home studio on either side of the shutter.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
P.S. – I’ve recently completely changed over my photo storage and processing over to the Mac. This has caused me to do quite a few things differently and this post is with new blog posting software on a brand new computer. I’m also posting this remotely so please forgive me while I work some of the bugs out of my posts. – JLJ
Surprise Car Show
I happened upon a car show in an office parking lot in San Mateo last month and had to stop and take some pictures. I don’t know anything about the event, and it was a complete surprise to me, but since I had my camera and it was a nice afternoon…it turned out perfectly. I quickly parked and proceeded walk through the show and take pictures before anyone could stop me. I was careful to not intrude and carefully wait for the opportunity to get the shots I wanted and then just as quietly as I arrived, walk back to my car and drive away.
After getting home and looking through the shots, I saw that I liked the grunge effect on the gleaming metal of the cars, especially on the lovely shiny paint and chrome. So I’m posting just a few of my favorites from the outing and a few more to my site for now.
There were so many wonderful cars there and here are a few of my favorites:
This 1969 Pontiac G.T.O. Judge was an amazing example of raw street power available in the late 60s and early 70s:
A genuine 1966 Ford Mustang Shelby G.T. 350 (Hertz). Incredible car, you can purchase one for yourself here:
And to round out the big three, I’ll include something from MOPAR too, back before they combined with AMC, Jeep, Daimler, Fiat, etc… I believe this is a 1973 Dodge Challenger
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
Fire Dancers
Even though my work schedule has been pretty busy, I have still been fortunate enough to find time to get out and shoot. Unfortunately, that hasn’t translated to enough time to process and post, but hey, I’d MUCH rather have a job that helps supplement my passion than to only have the option to make my passion support me.
Well, anyway, one of my outings was to visit a group of fire dancers who get together each month in San Francisco at Justin Herman Plaza, just across the street from the Ferry Building. On this evening, I was determined to get shots with the Ferry Building in the background and happily, I got a couple that I liked. I’ve also become enamored with the “grunge” effect preset that I created from watching Matt K’s Edgy Grunge Effect video..
Here are a few images from the evening:
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
September 11th
This past weekend, in tribute to the fallen in the World Trade Center Terrorist Attack, the City of San Francisco lit up Coit Tower in Red, White and Blue. I wanted to have a chance to see it and grab a few shots since I don’t know if this will be an annual tribute or if it was done in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of that morning. Here are a few of the shots I got from my visit after dark last night.
I couldn’t pass up these reflections on the hoods and windows….
And the view from Taylor Street…
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
Resonate
The challenge was to produce an image representative of the word resonate. I think in images, and the first image that came to mind was of waves resonating out from a point in a pond, but unfortunately it was a windy day and I was sitting at my dining room table.
I’d done some playing around with water drops, fairly unsuccessfully, in the past and thought I might try it again. This time, I decided to use a glass snifter instead of a wine glass to give me a little more surface area. I also liked the idea of using natural light instead of making my own light.
The following shots were the result of my shooting. I liked the waves as well as the nice background of the sky, trees and vertical blinds.. I also liked the “crispness” of black and white. These are my favorites out of the 22 frames I shot in that session.
Jonathon
Blog: https://jljfoto.wordpress.com
Site: http://jljfoto.com
Fine Art Site: http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jlj-photography.html
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Jonathon L. Jenkins (JLJFoto) 