Mielke Photography

This blog should have been written some time ago.

I have a friend who when he describes people he says they are “good people” It’s a saying that has always kinda stuck with me and I have incorporated it into my speech pattern. It means a lot in very few words. Something I’m not very good at.

As most of you know, I got married earlier this year. Being my second time, it gave me a little latitude and relaxation about the event. I think that having an Y-Chromosome helps in this department as well. I did want to have good pictures though. That is where the story begins. We hired Wes Hope of Hope Photography – a photographer in the Knoxville area – after looking through his portfolio we were very excited. After Meeting Wes and Danielle Hope for our engagement shoot we were even more pleased. I’ll let Wes take over the story about how he hot hurt here if you are interested. Needless to say as we were packing up and getting ready to go we get a panicked phone call from Danielle explained that with two broken elbows Wes was not going to be able to take any pictures. They professionally had a backup and I could choose another if needed.

Well I went to Tara’s site and she does things a little different than my traditional spirit had in mind at least for Kate and I’s wedding. I could tell though that the most important thing is now how it looks, but how it is composed. That and how these see the important moments. She also in her favor is a Nikon shooter. Wes on the other hand shoots Canon. I called back Danielle and asked if Wes could Post Process them and she said he could. I said let me talk to Tara and I’ll let you know.

So some 20 minutes later after talking to Tara on the phone, I heard the above phrase going through my head. “Good people” During this conversation she let me know that she had a Holga, well two. I wanted her to bring only one as I hadn’t seen one and even better I was hoping to get some pictures. Well guess what, she forgot it. Since our wedding was some two hours through the Smoky’s it made it impossible to go back and get it.

The wedding went great and Tara was wonderful, we chatted and had a great time. The pictures turned out great as well. Except of course the Groom, he had a few problems and was an ugly lug.

Later as I followed her Blog I saw all of the Holga pictures she took and I loved them! I always commented how I liked them and wished she hadn’t forgotten it for our wedding. I probably sounded like I was harassing the poor woman, but I genuinely was thinking how cool they might have turned out. I was never mad, just bumbed.

Well a couple of months after the wedding this box shows up at my door and I open it and guess what is in it, but a Holga, from Tara at Dixie Pixel. I now feel like a lout, because not only have I not let her know I got it, but I haven’t also yet thanked her for the gift. I’m sure it’s not every day that a Groom gets a parting gift from their wedding photographer.

Thanks Tara and I can’t recommend her enough and the passion she brings and work she does for her clients will be appreciated by all and the pictures are rad to.

Is rad still “in”

Holga Box Opening from Chris Mielke on Vimeo.

For me there is nothing like the day you get a camera in the mail. The excitement of opening the box the anticipation of getting the battery in. Thankfully they always seem to ship with about 1/2 a charge. The memory card loaded. Hefting the camera in your hands and how the weight feels. A new camera day is a blessed event. Some first pictures have been of family, some of the wall in the house. Some have been of myself. Others have been a family portrait. Still another was of an old girlfriend (yikes)…I no longer have that first picture. The first picture is sacred, well except for that last one. Today a new toy arrived. I have sold a bunch of lenses recently and was able to upgrade my D300 to a D700. Life is good for me.

The fist pictures above isn’t quite like any others, Holy competing pop icons Batman!! We have a blending of the old with the new, even of family members. You will see Star Trek, Cinderella, Cars and one loved by all in the family Wall-E.

To my knowledge almost everyone in the world celebrates some sort of Holiday in the month of the December. Today and tomorrow is the one that I celebrate. I could Google and find what they all are, but that would be too much work. I have personally always enjoyed Festivus, but few seem to celebrate. I especially enjoyed the part where I tell all of my closest friends and family how they disappointed me this past year.

Just kidding. Maybe that is why we don’t celebrate this anymore?

My Happiest Wishes for whatever Holiday you celebrate.

It’s coming up on almost a year since I made the leap to a Mac. I am still surprised how everything just works together and how quick it is to put professional looking documents together with so little fuss. I opened iMovie today and only 3 hours later I have a great looking movie set for posting with music, scene cuts and text all incorporated and selected by me. What a great Christmas present for someone. What I need to do is figure out a way to share it.

Mat & Marnie Bridal Shower from Chris Mielke on Vimeo.

Oh wait, that is a Pelican isn’t it? Well who would have thought to see a Pelican in this weather. I have to admit being a Midwesterner my whole life winter after 40+ years. The last two though I do have something to look forward to. Bald Eagles over the Mississippi River. As many other bodies of water start to freeze up the Bald Eagles migrate their way towards open water. Thanks to are Army Corp of Engineers and the Lock and Dam system there are many spots full of open water and an Eagles delicacy fresh fish. From about Thanksgiving on depending on the weather you will see the eagles start to pour into many different areas on the Mississippi. I’m sure all know that the Bald Eagle used to be an endangered species, those days are long gone with my own eyes counting easily in the 100s at a time. Now I get excited once again for winter as I get to take the long lenses out and explore as a wildlife photographer. Much fun.

What I’ve found recently is other birds as well along the river inlets. A Pelican in the snow was a recent visitor on this trip. I also unfortunately had an opportunity to relearn another problem first hand, how to stalk. Most don’t seem to realize that it takes much patience to get birds up close. Even with long lenses. Unless your going to some places in Florida or other hot spots you can’t just blunder in and expect to take close shots. As I was sneaking up on this pelican I had a Canon shooter with his 70-200 lens bump into me as I was stalking this bird on the ice amongst some Geese. Now the correct way to stalk is to not show your face and as you step forward give the bird nothing but your back, or at least hide your pasty face behind the lens(at least mine is pasty especially in winter). I figured I had at least a good hour of stalking before I could get real close to this bird. Well he decided to come up on one side and the birds started moving off in the other direction, since that didn’t work for him he rotated all the way around past me to the other side and practically at a gallup plopped his tripod in the ground to try and get some pictures. Well guess what as you can see in this picture, I got the birds butt flying off.

Best moment was when he came back to me as I was packing up because all the birds LEFT after his intrusion. He was very excited for me, wanting to know if I had got them flying off. He seemed pleased that I might have gotten a great shot. I wanted to let him know that a great shot is difficult to get without the bird there.

This trip was a struggle, the snow started about 10:00am and kept coming. Not great weather when you need fast shutter speeds and low ISO. I think though it’s going to make me make the switch from the D300 to the D700 though. I’ll let the viewer take a guess on which were taken with the D3 and which with the D300. To my eye there was a huge difference looking at the 100% view.

Just a small gallery this time along, though I took hundreds I narrowed it down to the best of the bunch.

The whole gallery begins here.

A slideshow can be found here.

As Always please comment.

I know I have asked through the years how do I get better at photos. Well I have finally found the secret. Just take pictures. It sounds simple, but all of the book reading and classes won’t help you unless you apply the knowledge. I speak from experiance. If I read something or attend a class without ever applying when the time comes when I am in the field I think, well I know I can do this but I don’t know how. Practice, practice and even more.

As I was looking through my libraries recently I noticed a continuing trend. Every year I have taken more pictures than the year before. That even goes with when I made the transition to digital. In the film days we had an excuse to not try things, today we don’t. Just Take Pictures. Repeat after me, Just Take Pictures.

Easy enough.

The above was taken on the way to yet another golf course in September. I saw the sun rising in my rearview mirror and yanked the strearing wheel over and jumped out slapped the camera on the back of the car and clicked away.

It’s nice to have a pro looking over your shoulder. Though I have done most of my learning on photography via book, video or magazine, I have recently found that I have probably taken that form as far as I possibly can and that I needed some actual “hands-on” time with a teacher. Being a faithful reader of The F Stops Here and it’s writer David Tejada, I was quick to jump when his workshop came anywhere near where I live in Chicago. In this case to a place I am quite familiar with, Detroit! Making the late-night drive with every conceivable piece of equipment I could put in the back of the van Kate and I arrived in Detroit. She was kind enough to go along for the drive, little did I know she would be part of the class!

David is one of the most personable people you might meet. He seemed very eager to get to know us and to also pass along his information. Erik Lawrence is the type of assistant that we would all want. I was envious when David would just motion with the fewest words and then Erik would move into action and have something all set-up while David continued his lecture. Though I’m sure some may debate this Erik however does not look as good as my wife. I have some advantages.

The morning session was the basics of lighting and how it affects your picture. The most telling of slides was how light falls off and it’s effect on F-stop. That slide alone showed how little light you might need to creatively light a scene. I believe this is the Inverse Square Rule. After looking through information on that, I liked David’s Slide better. I wished I had taken a picture of it to share.

I’ll get into a specific example and how it has recently helped me in a moment. David’s class was thorough and really showed how a working pro solves his problems and the equipment that he uses. A CD was provided with the list of equipment choices at the end of the class. The fun part of the class started in the afternoon. What we did as a class was work through a lighting of a scene to show how he develops what he sees and how to shoot it. He walked us through this in multiple areas, both inside and out. He highlighted the strengths of each scene and how you control the light that you not only have available, but also the light you bring. Nothing could be more telling than the following pictures below.

In this first picture we were in the kitchen and David is showing how bright this scene is. This is a kitchen with stainless appliances and shelving, you can see at picture right the large diffused windows that are glowing with beautiful diffused light. The problem is capturing a picture that controls the light you have available. You can see in the next picture that using the diffused light from the windows without bringing any of your own light into the scene. This would be exposing for the ambient light.

In the last example you can see what is done when you creatively control the light. I know if I saw these I would have guessed that they were taken hours apart instead of just minutes!

This lesson alone made a trip I made to Zion later in the year all that much better. I knew from this class that if I supplied the light I should be able to capture this scene with 8 stops of contrast and compress them so you not only could have Kate and I lit in the front, but the rocks of Zion in the back perfectly exposed. I walked through all of the items from the above class, checking my ambient light and then figuring out how to manually bring my own light creatively to the scene. I was giddy after this shot because I had applied something I had learned and designed in my head and pulled it off on the screen. I know it doesn’t take much to amuse me.

I highly recommend a class with David, he also has a mentoring session out in Death Valley with Nikon in February. I also recommend both his and Erik’s blogs.

After the class we all got together for dinner at a local eating place. We shared alot of photography stories and had a chance to ask even more questions not only of the group, but of David as well.

After dinner Kate had never seen Detroit before and I with a little nudging, well alot set out to see it again. Detroit has been beaten up in the news lately, but it is a very scenic city. It rests along the Detroit river and if you didn’t have to go into another country to take shots there might be more of it. Belle Island Park sits in the middle of the Detroit River and allows you to bypass all of the customs officials to grab some sunset pictures from it’s shores.

A nice trip.

As always you can see a slide show of all of the pictures here.

If you would like to go through them at your own pace go here.

As always please comment.

I have always operated without a filter on the front of my lenses. I’ve never had an issue in the number of years that I have been into photography. I have never been passionate about this, but I made the change number of years ago without any thunder. I remember when I made the change, I was as nervous as a soon-to-be groom standing at the alter. (Having done this twice now, it doesn’t get better as you get older. Frankly the second time I figured she would get wise and head the other direction at the last moment!) As the years piled up though without any problems, I just realized that they probably aren’t needed. This though caught my eyes as I was going through a fellow Bloggers site. Her blog can be found here. The article can be found here.

Not for the faint of hear though…it makes me want to go out and purchase a Bgn lens at KEH though, just to see how it does.

I have driven by this home many times and never stopped to look in. Montauk was owned by Iowa’s 12th Governor. Back in the day when we named our mansions. Today the modest home would not be called much of a mansion, but I’m certain back in 1874, this was something special. It is currently a working farm. In fact the day I was there, they were picking some vegetables. Some of the last of the season. It also has a few short trails. There are also 4 statues of Union Generals on the property. I assume these were added later and the Governor didn’t have those amongst the crops. Despite all of the reading that I have done I can’t seem to find out why the Union Generals also have statues here. I was really drawn to these statues mostly because of a good friend. He happens to be from Mississippi and as I was dating my wife I used to make quite a few driving trips into the south. There are many constant reminders of the Civil War throughout the south. There are Battlefields, the flag which causes much controversy and monuments to those days gone past. There are also the memories of the people and still even years later much bitterness. I’m still a yankee to many of the places of business that I go to, I can’t escape that.

Through many discussions with Bubba, I found the correct way to say richt-yonder and over-yonder and the difference between the two. (Who knew!) I will admit to making a very odd sounding Reich-yonder like I was from France on one of these dialect coaching classes. when I came across these statues. I had to take photos. I wasn’t even aware that Iowa sent any soldiers to the Civil War, I was informed differently here.

I worked on details in this series of photos. I have never been accused of being great and covering them, but in this case, I think I did OK. As each of my readers know I like grand vistas, but most of the time, life truly is captured in the small details. I hope you see that in what I collected.

The last series of pictures is from The Harvester. Some will note that I did these blogs out of order when I talked about this course in an earlier blog. I know each of my faithful readers you hate when I blog out of order, but indeed in this case it was necessary.

The Harvester was a wonderful place to play and highly recommended it. Just North and slightly west of Des Moines, in Rhodes it has hole names like Big Hog, Serendipity and Holy Cow. Bales of hay are alongside many of the holes. Unlike Erin Hills you see what the trouble is in front of you and you can plan. I foolishly played aggressivly on hole 9 and got a double bogey for my efforts. On 18 which is laid out almost L-shaped around a lake I found myself in perfect position and carried a 3-wood all the way to the front edge of the green. Needing Birdie to break 80 I was in a perfect spot. A poor chip later and an indifferent putt I meekly took bogey. Nothing is more exciting though than having the chance to break 80 and having nothing but open water in front as you rip a 3-wood to the final green.

I ate in the resteraunt after my meal on the veranda looking over that same 18th hole. Good food. As I left I thought I should have had a cigar and watched the sun set. Alot of fun either way.

As always you can see the whole collection in slideshow format here.

You can also go through the gallery at your own pace here.

Comment either here or on the website.

I will admit to being a big fan of this company even before this experience. I really like their gear. Every article seems to fit, work and better yet has some well thought out extras. My wife also looks good wearing there stuff and that is always an advantage in my book.

Having said that I recently purchased some gear on close-out at the Yosemite shop on a trip out to west last year. The material it was made from was not the best and had a tendency to snag easily. It wasn’t that the shirts weren’t well made, they were. The material or blend used though was easily snagged. Both shirts, one collared and the other a regular Tee were made of the same material. I wish I had saved what it was, so I could warn each of my faithful readers what it was, but I didn’t.

I tried to wear the clothing even after the snags appeared, but they kept growing until finally despite how much I liked the two shirts I found that I couldn’t. Knowing that Mountain Hardware has a lifetime warranty I contacted them for an RMA.

I include the link to the warranty here. I sent an email to them and shortly after I was contacted by Kent Laak issuing me an RMA. Having never sent any clothing back to a company I wondered about my chances of having them either replace or repair as is listed in the warranty. You did read the link didn’t you? About a week later I contacted Mr Laak again and low and behold he informed me that I had a credit at the Mountain Hardware website for the cost of the articles and this is how I am to claim it.

Sure I can get snarky and say that I have to purchase it at MSRP, but they also gave me MSRP as their part of the replacement. Another company that stands by their product AND has excellent customer service. Kudos to Mountain Hardware. Any chance Mr. Laak you could consult with Adobe and help them out?

Though I have never been confused with being a great portrait photographer, this part of my photography has steadily gotten better. Though the above is not one of my best efforts, it does merit a story. I had grand plans when I arrived. My Great Aunt was in town and that is rare for the month of November. She usually is wintering in Florida by Thanksgiving. I wanted to get a family picture. My great plans included a nice park with play toys for the children used as props, picture of my Aunt and children hanging upside down next to her on the monkey bars, me moving the light deftly into the correct spot quickly and feverishly.

I arrived and dinner was sooner than I anticipated, my sister was sick with the flu and nobody wanted to go outside because it was cold. I opted for the backyard. The first spot was on a little stream that bisects my sister’s property. The lights kept falling down and the space was too small for the CLS to work properly, the lights weren’t being triggered. After I resolved those issues, I then found that my aunt wouldn’t be able to walk to the spot I had chosen. So plan 2.

A family picture with my best attempt to control the hot spots in the background. I got 5 pictures and one pose. This was the best of the bunch. The other way without the setting sun was an old dilapidated aluminum shed that was facing the other way. It’s family though and I love them despite the hot spots.