What’s in a Photograph?

A lot more goes into taking a photo than you might think. It’s not just about pointing your camera and pressing a button. The photographer has to make sure that the photo is eye-catching. This means that if you look at it from a distance, you’ll want to come closer and see it better. For that, photographers have to pay attention to colors and shapes, and how they balance and complement each other.

Composition is one element of photography that needs a lot of attention. This part is about the photograph's area and the objects and subject contained within the photograph. See examples and read all about it by CLICKING HERE.

For an experienced lesson in photography, Leslie Wilkes, a Nashville Photographer and teacher, can take your photographs to much higher levels, from learning to use your DSLR camera to framing and compositional elements within the photo.

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Visit Leslie Wilkes online, or give him a call at his Nashville Photography studio at (615) 585-4531.

Great Things Are On The Horizon....

Great things are coming for Wilkes Photography.  I have a lot of things in motion right now and am really looking forward to what the future holds for me and my family.  I will let you know as the dominoes fall into place.  I just got notified that I was going to get to photograph the graduating class of Merrol Hyde Magnet School 2014, a great opportunity for me to learn and grow as a professional and build my client base.  I am looking at starting a marketing relationship Roy Matlock Jr and his company DefiNet Marketing.  They have some great ideas to boost my internet presence and grow my client base.  I look forward to what God has planned for me and my family and eagerly await our next chapter.

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Leslie Wilkes Owner/Photographer
#LeslieWilkesPhotography.com

Wilkes Photography !!!!WINS!!!! Mayors photo contest.

Great News for Wilkes Photography!! 

I was just informed that my Skyline Photograph will be used to represent Nashville in its Advertising and Media/Online Publications.  I am very honored to have won this contest and can't wait to see My Photograph do Nashville Proud.

Here is the Press Release:

Mayor Announces Winners of Skyline Photography Contest

 ‘Nashville’s Sky Through My Eye’ Winning Photos to Help Promote City

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Mayor Karl Dean today announced the winners of a photographic competition called “Nashville’s Sky Through My Eye,” which challenged professional photographers and hobbyists in the area to get the best shot of the Nashville skyline. Winners are receiving a cash prize provided by sponsors and the honor of producing the city’s official skyline photograph.

“The winning photos creatively captured the beauty of our skyline and the vibrancy of our downtown,” Mayor Dean said. “Congratulations to our winners, as well as those who received honorable mentions, and thank you to all the photographers who participated.”

In the hobbyist category, the winner was Ryan Maciej and the second-place hobbyist was Tabitha Hawk.

• Maciej shot the winning photo from the Korean Veterans Bridge with a Canon 5D Mark III. He liked the shot because it included Cumberland Park and showed more than just the downtown skyline. An IT healthcare consultant, Maciej has been taking photographs as a hobby for three years. He is a Nashville resident.
• Hawk shot her photo with a Canon 5D Mark II from the Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge. The General Jackson Showboat just happened by during her photo shoot. She has been shooting on and off since 2006, and she is the owner of Nashville Computer Guru and a Nashville resident.

In the professional category, Leslie Wilkes was the winner and Kerry Woo came in second place.

• Wilkes, a resident of Hendersonville, Tenn., has been a professional photographer for more than 20 years, focusing on family portraits and teaching beginner photography classes. He uses a Nikon D800 camera and was on the Korean Veterans Bridge early one morning to capture the winning photo. He also works at Vanderbilt University Medical Center as a health systems analyst.

• Woo, a Nashville resident, has spent the past year shooting photographs professionally and previously worked in search engine marketing. He used a Nikon D7000 and shot the photo from the Bridge Building. He waited two hours before sunset to capture downtown in the moment between daytime commerce and the city’s nightlife.

- more -

Page 2, Mayor Announces Winners of Skyline Photography Contest

Judging was conducted by professional photographers and representatives from the Mayor’s Office, Metro Arts Commission, Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and Nashville Visitors and Conventions Corp.

The judging panel identified seven photographs in each category worthy of honorable mention for their unique perspective or creativity.

Honorable mentions in the hobbyist category include:

• Jeffery Moore – Knoxville, Tenn.
• Caitlin Selle – Nashville, Tenn.
• Michael Brannin – Nashville, Tenn.
• Jeffery Johnson – Nashville, Tenn.
• Paul Schatzkin – Pegram, Tenn.
• Hanako Kobayashi – Nashville, Tenn.
• Tom Hamilton – Nashville, Tenn.

Honorable mentions in the professional category include:

• Julie Cannon – Nashville, Tenn.
• Bruce Cain – Mt. Juliet, Tenn.
• Patrick Collins – Nashville, Tenn.
• Dwane Crews – Franklin, Tenn.
• Mike Noble – Nashville, Tenn.
• Kenn Stilger – Old Hickory, Tenn.
• Donald Claussen – Hendersonville, Tenn.

Winning photographs will be used by Metro Government, the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corp. for promotion of the city, including websites, publications and submission to national media outlets.

First place winners in the hobbyist and professional categories are receiving $1,000, generously donated by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corp. Second place winners are receiving a $250 gift certificate for in-house photofinishing services at Dury’s. Winning photographs will be printed courtesy of Chromatics and put on display at the Historic Metro Courthouse. Winners will also be featured in the January issue of Nashville Arts magazine.

The winning photographs and honorable mentions in each category are available to view online at www.skylinecontest.nashville.gov, as well as in an album on Mayor Dean’s Facebook page.

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All photos were taken between Oct. 1 and Oct. 31, 2013. Participants were told that photographs must capture the Nashville skyline to qualify, but there were no rules regarding time of day the photograph is taken, perspective from which it is shot or editing used on the photograph.

Boss' Christmas Present

 

Holt Plumbing Memories by Holt Staff | Make Your Own Book
I took on a project for some friends to surprise their boss this Christmas with a book.  I really like the ease of the BLURB Book product, but the line to get it in was pretty hefty last night.  I was up till 2:00am trying to send it and kept getting server errors on their end.  When I went to their Customer Service Site, it said they were over run with people trying to send in books on a coupon deadline, lucky me.  I can't wait to see the finished product, I hope the photographs are not too bad, I didn't take them.  They were low resolution scans, that will make some of them blurry.  The people I put this together for will not worry about that too much, they had what they had, some great photo memories at #HoltPlumbing.  #LeslieWilkesPhotography will work with what is given, and make the best of it.  I hope they enjoy,

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Merry Christmas

Leslie Wilkes - Owner/Photographer

#LeslieWilkesOwnerPhotographer

My Photography One-On-One Class

I just wanted to give you an update as to how my classes are going. I had a recent one this Sunday with Jeff B, he does great photography, I just helped him make it better, and make more sence as to why he was doing what. Here is a message Jeff Sent me after class that I posted on my website (http://www.LeslieWilkesPhotography.com) and now I am posting on my blog because I wanted to share his photograph. " I thoroughly enjoyed your photography class last Sunday. While I was already pretty familiar with the components that make up exposure (ISO, aperture, and shutter speed) the refresher was welcome and the practical application was invaluable - I was pretty solid on what it was but you taught me how to use it to my advantage. In addition, the post processing was also greatly appreciated. I am attaching the shot of the Schemerhorn fountain as both the camera and LR processing as JPG. The Lightroom image is the one ending in LR - which I like much better. Again, thank you for your efforts and I am looking forward to my next class. Feel free to use these pix on your site as student images with attribution. -Jeff And as we had discussed on Sunday, I am looking forward to a follow-up class - Probably a lot more lightroom - While I remember a lot of what we covered, I am sure some of it has slipped past. I am doing some post processing on the shots we took Sunday to refresh. Since I have them handy for comparison (and I can include the .nef if you wish) I am attaching the camera jpg and my LR jpg from the Shemerhorn fountain. Because of the difference, I intend to completely stop shooting raw+basic (.nef and .jpg) and just go with raw only the next time I shoot. Feel free to use the images on your web site in conjunction with your class. I would appreciate attribution though." -Jeff The attached photograph is Jeff Boarmans of the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in Downtown Nashville, he did a great job with allowing the water to flow in a timed tripod photograph.

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How Much Editing Is Too Much?

How much editing is too much?

This is one of those things that depending upon your artistic eye, could be too much or too little for some peoples taste. When I look at editing people as a family/portrait photographer, I usually try not to do too much to them. I want them to be as natural as possible, and to be recognizable to the audience that will be viewing the photograph. With this said, if the client wants a few years removed, then you remove a few years, keeping in mind that you don’t have to take them back to pre-school for them to look good. So when you are confronted with this question, I guess the answer is to do minimal work on people, unless instructed by the client. Then make sure you are smart enough, for the both of you, to know when to quit. If you are applying this to a fashion shoot, or something commercial, then you will do a lot more editing on whatever is human in the photograph because that is what the industry calls for. Again, you can be smart about your edits and make them as true to reality as possible, while maintaining a high level of service to your customer, the commercial agency. When photographing these types of events, it is not always about reality within the picture, it is about ultra-reality and fantasy. The photographer and the art department are expected to take liberties with the final product, so they can survive in a very intense commercial market.

Does that make it right or wrong? For me, I like taking photographs of families and portraits of individuals, and just touching them up enough to remove some blemishes or slight wrinkles is true to composition. I want to maintain the years they have earned, and not deny them of that in their final product. On the other hand, if the customer asks me to take more, then I will oblige them, but make sure they still look like themselves once the photo is finished.

I don’t mind working with cityscapes or anything that doesn’t have people in them, the sky is the limit, and the artistic eye can see infinite possibilities. I could then do a 180 and be just as happy with a few adjustments to the lighting and the clouds in the sky and call it a day.

How much editing is too much? I guess it depends on the project I’m working on, and always what the client asks for. Customer service and satisfaction are always my main goals when I deliver the final product.

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Leslie Wilkes Owner/Photographer

RAW or Jpeg??

Hello Everyone, I just want to start off by saying hello again! I am writing this morning about a subject I feel many have trouble with for one reason or another. Whether to shoot RAW of .jpg? To the professional photographer there is only one way to photograph, and that is in RAW. The reason for this choice is because of the limitless options you have after the shoot to manipulate the photograph into something more like what you envisioned when you were taking the picture. When you shoot in RAW, the options (editable options) are much more available to you than when you work with .jpg files. I am not saying don’t use .jpg, but as a professional, you won't see a lot of .jpg shooting on a daily basis by the professional photographer. Let me talk about RAW for a minute. When you hear the term, RAW, it makes you think of open, not restricted, untouched, mass, and anything that is "as is." To the photographer, professional or otherwise, the use of an open, non-compressed, file format such as RAW helps to make your photographic vision more of a reality by offering you the full range of manipulative adjustments that only a RAW file could bring. When using the non-compressed RAW file, you have light, shadow, exposure, contrast, white-point, black-point, and many more options in a much wider gamut than any other type of file. So if your picture isn't perfect, which they rarely are, you have some latitude of correction in post to make it more like what you envisioned. Let me talk about .jpg for a minute. The file type .jpg is a universally accepted file type that is easily read by most computers and applications, no matter what software you are trying to use it with. So I could take a .jpg file and run down to my favorite kiosk printer, and pop a CD/DVD or memory card in, and start printing photographs in the .jpg format without skipping a beat. (The converse of that is that you can't do that with a RAW file, most systems are not meant to read the RAW file type for mass printing, they have to be converted to .jpg files to use them in a mass market printer system.) The .jpg file is fully acceptable by most people as a working solution for their photography needs, just not mine, or most professional photographers. The .jpg file is a compressed version of what you saw when you were viewing your photograph through your camera. When I say compressed, I mean the picture that was saved to your camera has been mathematically manipulated to be restricted within a certain file size, depending on the way you set your camera up before taking the photographs. So, because of your settings, the picture saved has to fit in a certain amount of space. The amount of space determines what the camera will save and what the camera will discard as non-usable information, that is where the manipulative factor (editable information) comes in. When the camera can only keep so much information, it has to pick and choose what it will save, based on the file size and quality settings you made initially before photographing. The .jpg file is usually much smaller and has a lesser range of light, shadow, exposure, contrast, white-point, black-point, and fewer options in a much narrower gamut than RAW. They each have their uses, skill levels, and ability to be manipulated if needed. RAW or .jpg? You decide what you are going to do with the photographs, and that will usually help you decide how you are going to save your files, for me, RAW is the only way to go. If you are just starting out .jpg may be what you want to start with, and then move to RAW after you gain experience with your camera and software. Just to give you an idea of file size, when I shoot RAW (.NEF for Nikon), I can get 700 pictures on a 64 GB card. If I switch to high quality .jpg's, I can get around 3000 photographs on the same card. Those numbers, to me, show me what I would lose in the ability to edit and manipulate my photographs if I switched to .jpg all the time. I don't want to rough anybody up over the subject; it is a preferential choice as to what you want to do with your photographs, and what your end goal is with the images you shoot. Have a great week and keep photographing, Les Owner/Photographer www.LeslieWilkesPhotography.com

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