Christmas in New Orleans!

We wandered around Algiers Point after dark a couple of nights, and enjoyed the Christmas lights on the shotgun style houses.

On the Journey

Luke 2

 ¹ In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. ² (This was the first census that took place while^[a] Quirinius was governor of Syria.) ³ And everyone went to their own town to register.  ⁴ So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. ⁵ He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.

Joseph has a vision

Joseph has a vision

 
18 This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about[d]: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet[e] did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20 But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus,[f] because he will save his people from their sins.”

22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”[g] (which means “God with us”).

24 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

NIV

These Little People are so small, I used a couple of LED flashlights to light them
ISO 200 6 sec exposure -1.7EXP Program Mode, Matrix metering, tripod, 50mm lens.

Christmas Caroling

Crossroads bought the old St Peter's Church on James and they hosted the carol sing, Its a beautiful old catholic church inside. The highlight was the huge pipe organ that the organist played from in the balcony.

 After we sang, everyone was invited downstairs for punch and cookies, or Hot cocoa. The girls were so happy at the prospect of cookies.

"You will have a Son"

 

The Birth of Jesus Foretold

 ²⁶ In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, ²⁷ to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. ²⁸ The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”  ²⁹ Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. ³⁰ But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. ³¹ You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. ³² He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, ³³ and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
 ³⁴ “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
 ³⁵ The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called^[b] the Son of God. ³⁶ Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. ³⁷ For no word from God will ever fail.”
 ³⁸ “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.

NIV

The Christmas Story - Little People Style

Yep! This is just a teaser for what we'll be digging into this week. Full studio lighting of the Nativity story acted out by Little People from Fisher Price!

Luke 2:8 NIV

 And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.

Lit the shepherd with a 9 LED flashlight, hand held by my youngest assistant, Shaniah. Shot at 1600 ISO EXP-3.0, 1/13 no flash. There's a little shake, because I was too lazy to get the tripod, just wanted to see if it was going to work. That -3 EXP makes it very close to ISO 4800.

Lights on the Lake - Walking Edition

What can do you at Onondaga County Parks? Everything! 24mm 1/30 ISO1600(-1.0EXP) hand held

The two nights before Lights on the Lake opened, it's really open for walking. The first night is for walkers and the second night is for the dogs. We went on the second night, it was raining the night before. I've got hundreds of pictures of the light displays, but bring the camera along anyway.

Wonder! 26mm 1/40 ISO 1600(-1.0EXP) hand held

Now I find myself capturing images of what the kids see. Wonder and amazement at the light, right there where she can inspect it up close. Good luck finding a bulb like this at my house, we use CFL's. She's my engineer, so I would imagine that she was trying to figure out how it worked.
She was real impressed with the blue lights.

The Blue Lagoon 24mm 1/20 ISO 1600(-2.3EXP) hand held

You'll notice the pictures were all taken at ISO1600 and -X EXP compensation. With the Nikon D50, that's effectively increasing your ISO, ISO 1600 at -2.0 becomes ISO 3200. It's a little bit of a cheat, but it works when you've got to get the shot in the dark.

Christmas Portraits

There are only 41 days left to get your Christmas portraits done. 

Get those Christmas cards made up and ready for the mail.

Anybody else waiting for snow?

Christmas in Small Town Americana

In my home town there are many old houses and folks just dress them up with lights for Christmas. Here they are in their holiday beauty.

We don't even need Macys, we have our own beautiful windows that change with the seasons.

There are many more beautiful Christmas lights to see in our little slice of Americana. Check out the Flickr gallery here.

Christmas Eve Service

I did learn something on Christmas Eve, either shoot stills, or shoot video, but not both at the same time. The tallest girl on the left in the back is mine. She's great dancer and very happy to be dancing at church.

Happy Holidays to all.

Christmas Portraits

Now is the time to get your Christmas portraits booked. For the next two weeks, you can receive two complimentary 5x7 prints with your order.
We will deliver your prints by December 1st, so make your appointment soon.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas! Despite the coming rain and ice, and the many things to take care of we will take the time to remember the wonder of Christmas. Remember who it was that Mary laid in a feeding trough for animals - God in human wrappings came near.







How did I do it?

I didn't take a set up shot for this, but here's how it worked. The flash was on a cable stuck in the back of the stable, a Lumiquest softbox/bouncecard was used on the flash. I took the flash all the way down to the lowest setting 1/16 power, ISO 6, F1.6, I ramped up the shutter speed to somewhere around 1/640. Keep the baby interested in what she needs to be looking at, she tried to eat sheep a few times. I set up the shot in about 5 minutes and placed the baby in the frame and within 3 minutes we moved on to the next picture. We did a little cleaning of the background in GIMP 2.6. If you have a really good point and shoot, you may be able to do this, you'll need some light in the stable, a desk lamp or something to make it work.