Celebration! Abigail and Grayson's Wedding

Abigail and Grayson

Mayfair Farm Barn

This week I will not be discussing the finer points of Lightroom or showing yet one more way to display a beautiful tree. Instead, this week was all about my wonderful daughter Abigail, and Grayson, her, nearly as wonderful new husband.  There are times when life completely blocks any opportunities for the usual photography and last week was one of those great times. I apologize to those who come to this blog for tips on landscape photography, but this week is a celebration of life outside of the forest.

The Bloom Family Folk

Abigail and Grayson decided to have a small wedding, and this spring about 20 of their closest friends and family joined them for a ceremony at the edge of Fresh Pond in Cambridge Massachusetts.  With the wedding out of the way they were ready for a bigger celebration.  They chose a farm in the woods of New Hampshire.  Among the sheep and pigs, Mayfair Farm in Harrisville features a beautiful event barn which accommodated 120 friends and family for a locally raised dinner, the necessary speeches and then hours of exuberant dancing. 

Kerry, Cuyler and Don Bryant

Newcomer Family Folk

Everyone had a great time and, in addition to the mandatory father-daughter dance, I actually got out a few times to embarrass myself on the floor.  I promised Abby that I would play the part of the proud father and not let my camera get in the way of the professional photographer.  Of course, I couldn’t resist a few shots and Mark was wonderfully tolerant of my occasional second shooter role. 

Jeremy and Gina

Saturday night at the Mayfair Farm was the highlight, but the celebration extended through the entire weekend.  We had an informal welcoming taco bar buffet Friday night at Odelay  Restaurant in Keene and a great brunch on Sunday at our home in Spofford. 

Gina, Jeremy, Chris and Lisa

Of course, the brunch also gave me the chance to show off my new studio, which is slowly being filled with all the stuff which has been cluttering the house. The studio is becoming functional just in time for the long list of projects which have been accumulating. 

Susan and I were happy, but exhausted after the weekend, but we had no chance for rest.  We turned around and headed for NYC to see Hamilton and stay with Jeremy and Gina.  We will return just in time to set up for Art in the Park at Ashuelot River Park during the holiday weekend.  Whew!

Studio is beginning to fill

Longtime Friend Michele

Anyway, that is why my blog is late and why I can only throw up some happy party pictures.  This business of being “retired” is exhausting.  I promise to get back to real photography stuff next week.

Jeff Newcomer
www.partridgebrookreflections.com

Abigail is Getting Married

High School Grad

Abigail is getting married this weekend, and I hope that I can be excused from my usual celebration of cold and impersonal trees and mountains to indulge myself with a few images that reflect my beautiful daughter’s spirit, love, wit, brilliance and dedication to the service of others.  

There are no tears here.  Abby is marrying a wonderful man. Grayson is a good match for her strong personality, and after seven years it is about time!

Determination, Abby and Susan

Gap Mountain, Nelly, Ab and Dad

  The only crying comes from the fact that Abby has made it clear that I am NOT allowed to take any pictures of the ceremony.  I guess I understand.  She has a wedding photographer and she wants me to be free to be part of the ceremony, without a camera around my neck.  Abby has even taken my camera to be used for the video.  Ok, she is definitely the boss, but of course I will have my little Canon G11 neatly hidden in my pocket.

Ab and Bart

I have reviewed lots of old pictures, and have picked out about one hundred, ranging from her birth and first vocalizations (immediately after), all the way to her time with Grayson.  I will largely let the pictures do the talking.  In addition to the few images here, I have placed a larger collection in a Gallery on my website.  I hope Abby will not be too embarrassed, but I have seen an endless procession of  pictures of young children from my friends, and I feel that I can be allowed my chance to show some old 

pictures -  at least while we patiently wait for Grandchildren!

Jeremy and Abigail

My few words cannot remotely approach a resume of all of Abigail’s activities and accomplishments.  Simply speaking, I am endlessly amazed by my daughter’s intelligence and poise, and her ability to disarmingly connect with all sorts people, and I am so proud.

Early years

From birth, Abby had an often exhausting store of energy.  She loved to talk but also to quietly ease-drop on the adult conversation.  Throughout her local schooling she had a remarkably talented group of friends who spent much of their time in friendly, loving  competition.

Reading with Grampy

Away to School

Abby in Washington - Not her real Office

Abby went to Bates College in Maine and then completed a Masters in Public Policy at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy.  Since then, first in Washington DC and recently in Cambridge Massachusetts, she has worked on projects designed to help the underprivileged and disadvantaged.  Of course, we are happy that she was able to move her job closer to home in Cambridge.

Chesterfield Friends

The Wedding

Beautiful Abby at Fresh Pond

Of course the wedding was beautiful.  It was an intimate affair with only about twenty close family and friends.  We gathered in a park on Fresh Pond in Cambridge and, happily, rain held off.  Grayson's sister-in-law Kerry did an amazing job with the ceremony and surprised us all by hiring an acapella group to float in at the end of the service singing All You Need is Love. It was the perfect "Love Actually" moment.  After the ceremony, we all retired to a local beer pub to continue the informal celebration.  

It was a great weekend.  Abby wouldn't let me take many pictures and I had to sneak some with my pocket Canon G11, but the end result is that I have a married daughter and a wonderful son-in-law.  And I'm sure the "Professional" pictures will be great.  Yeah! 

Abigail Has Her Grayson

But She Will Always be Home With Us

  

Jeffrey Newcomer

www.partridgebrookreflections.com

Head & Nose Room

Katherine & Rama,
Hood River Oregon, August, 2012

Heads Up!
This week I have a brief discussion of the "rules" governing the best amount of headroom and nose room in a photograph.   The important point is that these are not absolute, but they do provide great guides for effective portrait and landscape photography and as so often,  it comes back to thirds.
 

Beautiful Evergreen Dead Space

I was reminded of this while editing pictures from Katherine and Rama’s wedding in Oregon last summer.  Headroom refers to amount of space above a subjects head in a composition. Many people frame pictures of people with the head(s) dead center in the image. It makes sense since the faces are the essential focus of interest for the photo, but, as is true for so much of good composition, what makes intellectual sense does not often produce the best esthetic results. Too much room and the subject looks small against the large area of dead space hovering above. Too little and the top of the frame begins to look like an absolute ceiling, drawing the subject upward.  

 









 

As is true in all portrait photography, the eyes are the key element rather than the top of the head and the location of the eyes usually defines the best amount of headroom.  The final answer is a matter of taste, but in general the most pleasing results come from placing the subject where it looks most stable within the frame. Perception studies have been done using a single dot in a frame to define the neutral point. This is the location where the dot seems to be at rest rather appearing to be drifting either to the center or the sides. the result is that images generally look best with the eyes about 1/3 down from the top of the frame. This should sound familiar since it is just another manifestation of the classic Rule of Thirds. Ok, if it didn't work so well, the Rule of Thirds might seem like an overly constraining edict. You should feel free to be a rebel and break the rules whenever you want - I'm not your mother.  But it is good to understand the rules that you are breaking, and the Rule of Thirds is at least a good departure point for many compositions. Why else would I have placed in capitals? 


Research aside, it just looks better. Moving away from these comfortable neutral locations can add a bit of creative tension to

Mountains Have It Alberta,
Valley of the Ten Peaks, Alberta, Canada

a scene. I give it a try every so often, but I always seem to come back to some permutation of the thirds.  For headroom, the most common reason I will violate the rules is when the background is deserving of greater emphasis. One classic example would be when the subject is standing in front of a majestic mountain scene, such as the Ten Sisters in the Canadian Rockies. The rule can also be effectively violated in extreme close-ups. Zooming into the eyes and mouth, the forehead may be cut off without too much pain. In Jon’s portrait, I came in close but still kept the eyes at about 1/3 from the top. 

Jon's Head

The Nose Knows! 

Eagles on the Connecticut River, Vermont

Nose Room

The Gaze; the Eyes Have It

Nose room is the amount of open space left in the direction of a subjects gaze when they are looking away from the camera or when they are moving across the frame. In the photographs of the eagles on their nest along the Connecticut River, placing the bird’s direction of gaze against the side of the frame is obviously restricting. We want to ask, "Why are those eagles staring at the wall?". With adequate nose room the question is transformed into curiosity to discover 

Nazca Boobie: Flight Room

what is attracting their attention. In this situation it is both literally and figuratively true that subjects need adequate breathing room. When shooting on the run, such as birds in flight, it is often tough enough to keep the subject in the frame. the center is fine as long as you leave enough space the crop into a more balance composition.


The Hills are Alive: And Have Heads and Noses
 
Without an animal in site, nose and headroom can still be important in landscape images.  Decisions about how much sky to include in a photo and whether trees should be cut off can have a significant effect on how the subject and flow of an image is emphasized. How much sky to include is often affected by the interest in the sky itself. When the sky is a bland, gray, I try to crop out most or all of the dead 
space, but sometimes the sky IS the story.   Strong landscape compositions usually have a clear direction of flow which requires its own "nose room".  As a viewer’s gaze follows the flow it can be uncomfortable to have that gaze run unbuffered into the side of the frame. In the image of Darling Hill Road  in Lyndonville Vermont, the

Cut off the Nose

diagonal road creates a strong direction of gaze which would end awkwardly if it ran right into side of the image. As always there are important exceptions. When the flow of an image is tied to a flowing stream, it is usually comfortable to let the brook run of the edge of the frame. 









The guidelines for head and nose room don't come from complex calculations, they come from how we see - how our visual cortex interacts with and filters the immense rush of visual input and allows us to attend to what is important.  All the rules aside, the best way to tell if you have the spacing right is if you don't notice the head and nose room at all.

All of this discussion is just one of the easiest to understand aspect of what is called "negative space", the space around the main subject of an image, which can help balance a composition, draw the eye and provide breathing room for the subject.  Stay tuned for more on negative space, as soon as I figure it out.

 Just two final points:

• I enjoy shooting at friend's wedding, but I DO NOT do weddings!

• And for my daughter - GO BLUE!