An Instrument of Praise

Gena is a dear friend and neighbor. She plays piano at our church and we've lived right around the corner from her for about 15 years. Our kids grew up knowing each other and hanging out together.

Gena has been teaching piano in her home for many years. Her brother is also an accomplished pianist and recently decided to "upgrade" his instrument. This Yamaha baby grand was his piano before his recent purchase. It now graces the front room of Gena's home and her students have a really outstanding piano at which to sit and learn.

This was a challenging shot because the room that the piano is located in is quite small. The piano occupies at least one half to two thirds of the floor space. The location of windows and other things in the room further restrict the possible shooting angles. And the distance from the piano to the back wall is very short, making it somewhat difficult to control the light on the background.

The back wall is also just a plain white painted surface. I wanted to spruce things up just a bit so I placed a blue gelled flash down on the floor in the space between the piano and the wall and shot it downward into a large white reflecter, resulting in the blue background.
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An Unexpected Compliment

Strobist blogger David Hobby gave out the second assignment for the 2009 Strobist Bootcamp II about a week and half ago. This time the assignment was a food product shot.

I must confess that I didn't warm up to the challenge very quickly. Product photography and still lifes have never held much interest for me and I spent most of the week arguing with myself as to why I wouldn't bother with this one. But guilt got the better of me on the night before the due date and I hastily tried to put something together.

Based on what I saw of the other submissions, I thought this was pretty lack luster and while I wasn't embarassed by the end result, I also didn't think it demonstrated anything particularly noteworthy.

Low and behold, I'm looking at my Flickr account and my submission got one of David's "Nice Work!" postings. As he did on the first assignment, he goes through all 700+ submissions and any that he thinks are potential candidates for the final round get a "thumbs up" comment from him on Flickr. Needless to say a "thumbs up" or "nice work" from David Hobby is a pretty big deal to an aspiring amateur photographer and new Strobist.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll also get one of the highlights in the final results posting on the Strobist blog. But even if I don't, I'm more than content to get this nod of approval.
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