Nicole and Bass #1

I thought I'd post a few photos from a shoot I did last week with Larry Patrick and our friend Nicole, who's a musician, scientist, and a great person to have in front of your camera. About two years ago we photographed her on the beach with her saxophone. For this shoot we decided to photograph her with her upright bass at Kempner Park in Galveston. As the sun got low and was filtering through some trees Larry and I began experimenting with back light and lens flare, something I've really grown to love over the past few years. I played with some shots with the sun directly behind her head, but settled on this shot with the sun peaking around her head right at eye level. 1/60 sec at f/13, ISO 200.

#527 -- Lensbaby or Nik #3?

Another photo of Julie at the beach during our maternity photo shoot. This shot was taken opposite the sunset which is behind me and to camera right. That light was enhanced with a speedlight in a Westcott Rapid Box at about 1/16 power, no gel, just the natural warm light.

#526 -- Lensbaby or Nik #2?

Here's another photo of Julie at the beach. I broke one of the basic rules of photography by placing her dead center. The seagull in the upper right was taken from another photo shot that day and blended in. I did a lot of color work on this image -- added some red in the shadows and shifted the highlights a little warmer, also desaturated the blues a little. I liked the fact that there are only two real dominant colors in the image -- reds and blues. Even the sky here has that same tonality. So, take your best guess -- Lensbaby or Nik?