I'm enjoying learning how to shoot portraits. Lucky for me my wife is very comfortable in front of the camera and doesn't mind me practicing on her. On a recent trip back to our home state of Louisiana we were fortunate enough to get some time alone from the kids so we could go out and play photographer and model at a nearby park. The evening sun was low in the sky and the weather was perfect except for the 95% humidity which is very common is southern Louisiana. Because of the low light conditions I chose to use a 17-85mm f/4 lens with the 580EX II flash on my Canon EOS 40D DSLR. My goal that evening was to get the setting sun and sky in the background with a properly exposed facial features and correct skin tone.

Image #1 - EXIF: 1/250 Sec., F5.6, ISO 400, 66mm, Flash

Image #2 - EXIF: 1/100 Sec., F5.6, ISO 400, 85mm, Flash


Image #3 - EXIF: 1/250 Sec., F5.6, ISO 400, 75mm, Flash


While these aren't perfect, my wife likes the results from that evenings photo shoot and I learned a little bit more about how to take a portrait photo.