Memories are important

One of the things that's keeps me taking photos of people is the thought that one day that memory will be important.

I've had two occasions in the last week that have reminded me of this.

1. My youngest daughter turned 18 so it fell to me to put together a slideshow of her first 18 years for use at her party. As I am putting this together I'm reminded of the many occasions where I didn't take pictures and could have.

2. One of my very good mates died last week, the funeral was yesterday. Cancer took him far too early. As far a funerals go this was one of the most uplifting I have been to. During his last months we spent a bit of time together and because of our mutual interest in photography we often had our cameras. I regret not taking more photos of him. It's not a very blokey thing to do - taking pictures of your mates. But from this vantage point that was a short sighted perspective - He was much loved and will be missed. Photos are helpful in revitalising memories and grieving well for those who have passed.

So don't be shy - take your camera, use it and store up memories of your loved ones.

I also gained a new appreciation for the face recognition features of Aperture. It was useful to be able to quickly find photos for use in celebrating his life.

There's a good article on this topic on DPS today.

Composition - Use your eyes there is always a photo to take.

Yesterday I needed to get the car washed - It was the first sunny day we had had for what felt like a month and the car needed it.

So with a long queue at the car wash and 40mins to kill I dropped the car off. Fortunately I had the 1D-X and our new Canon 70-200mm f2.8 L IS Mk II clipped in.

The car wash is at the end of a light industrial area that is uninteresting and bordering on neglect but I have learned that there is a photo in every location. Just open your eyes and use your imagination.

I thought I'd walk over the the railway line to get some passing trains, graffiti and whatever else I came across.

Now don't get me wrong - I took about 80 shots and only kept 18 so there was plenty experimentation.

But this shot is my favorite:

Yes there has been a little post processing:

Dropping saturation and reducing exposure on the left side as well as sharpening the prickles and the flower. Extra blur around flower.

But the composition is straight off the camera.

Here are few of the other keepers.

1D-X AF Tracking - Model Plane photography

A mate of mine asked me to go with him to take some pics of a model plane in flight he was doing a review of.

So grabbed the 1D-X and set off in his car. He is a professional photographer so I asked him what setup he would use for this.

400 ISO Shutter Priority set to 1/500th Evaluative Metering. The 1/500th speed was to stop the plane but still showing some motion in the propeller.

Sun was low in the sky so the plan was for some low passes with the sun behind us.

The Model is a BF109 whatever that is. Look it up.

I set the AF to AI Servo.

The 1D-X was attached to a Canon 100-400m L IS F4-5.6. It was the first time out with this combination and I immediately noticed the loss of the 1.6 crop factor from the 7D.

Also set the camera for high speed burst and we are ready to roll.

The thing with Model Plane photography is to try and photograph the model in life like situations. These models are "scale" so you are trying to simulate some realism in the shoot.

Not that easy when these things are buzzing around so fast.

The verdict? The AI Servo on the 1D-X works very well. Its fair to say that this job wasn't an extreme test for the AI Servo mode I shot over 200 frames and most of them were acceptable. With 55 of them printable.

Here's a few of the best.