New Look-Last Post of 2011

This might be the last post of 2011....enjoy...

Ah, the tired ol' swing...just because it's a swing...doesn't mean it can't rest!

taken this morning as I looked out from the bedroom....composed as an HDR

MCCS School Pictures !!

Well, we have just about wrapped up the editing of all the school pictures for Mount Calvary Christian School. Most of them have been uploaded to our website at .......www.johnarnoldphotography.net . Letters to parents will be going out tomorrow and orders should be placed by Friday, December 9th. As always, any questions should be directed to our email...jnaarnold@northstate.net

As requested......

Greene outdoor portraits.......
                              What a cold, blustery morning this was, but we all survived, but God was so good, and some great pictures were made!

North Carolina Christian School Association Convention--Myrtle Beach, SC

Panoramic shot from 12 stitched together photos from the balcony of the Schooners Hotel. Exposure and f/stop held constant. Lightly touched up in Photoshop.

(**Please click on photo to see larger view**)

Little green Grasshopper.....

Ok, so we found this little guy out in the garage and gave him a slice of lettuce and made a little photo-shoot for him. He never once tried to get away! He might be the one who is munching on our Weeping Cherry tree... We won't say what became of him after the pictures..just kidding, he crawled off to somewhere.

Spring Pictures have been ordered and are on their way!

The pictures are coming and should be in for the last day of school, Friday May 27th.Again, we are so sorry for the delay...but life has been very busy for the Arnold clan. Maybe one day, the Lord would see fit to have us do photography full time. Its all in His hands. Thank you to all you parents who have allowed us to work with your wonderful boys and girls! It is such a privilege to be involved with kids that have such a wonderful spirit about them, it really has been a joy.
John and Amy

2011 mount Calvary Christian School Junior-Senior Banquet

So every year Mount Calvary Christian School hosts their Junior-Senior Banquet for the 'upper' class. This year, Caleb Staley, Grant Owen and Caleb Owen were the guests of honor. The theme, as if you couldn't tell by the pictures, was 'Go west young man, go west!" What a great time and a great challenge from Pastor Callahan...again. As you can see, they had a little fun with the camera also. More too come...follow along.

I have been really trying to school myself on Adobe Photoshop CS4 and although it took me about three hours to create this 'Wanted' poster, I think the efforts were well worth it. Then, after all that, I was just adding the nails layers and the program froze. I was not able to save the .psd file, so I lost all my layer separations and presets...what a bummer! But at least it was saved as one whole image. I still have a lot of tweaking to do to the paper 'edges' and the colors, but all in all I am pretty happy with it. I will be uploading most of these to our parent site... HERE.

Aysia Arnold

Here's our daughter Aysia singing "All Through The Night" at the North Carolina Christian School Associations Fine Arts competition. Mrs. Susan Greene playing piano for her.

2011 NCCSA Fine Arts-Aysia Arnold from amy on Vimeo.

NCCSA Fine Arts- Claire Greene Award of Excellence!!

" Who'll Buy My Lavender?" from amy on Vimeo.

North Carolina Christian School Association Fine Arts Competition

Well, here is a video, albeit low resolution, of the performance by the "Special Group" put together by Ms. Caroline McPheron from Mount Calvary Christian School. The singers are from left to right: Tucker Arnold, Caleb Mallory, Scott Loupe, Caleb Greene, Claire Greene and Aysia Arnold. The song was written by Ron Hamilton, titled, " All That I Need". Piano by Mrs. Susan Greene.

Hello My Chicadee

Ok, I know, enough of the birds already right? Well, I couldn't resist. This little girl was feeding her chicks in a birdhouse down on our Cherry tree. Again, shot with the wonderful Nikon 70-200 2.8 ED lens...such magnificent glass, and the clarity and color are great. Not too bad for hand holding without a tripod! And if you have ever watched these little creatures...wow are they fast...you'd better have a fast lens..
J

And a Wren I found pecking around on a dead Pine tree...hopefully eating termites.. :)

Happy Easter!! It's Resurrection Sunday

After church this morning we headed to my wifes families Easter get together. Once we finished there we went and ate supper with my in laws and I snapped a picture of this Cardinal as she looked to be watching the setting sun. I hope she enjoyed her day as much as we did! A copy may also be found on our web page at.. http://johnarnoldphotography.zenfolio.com/p756507911/h3922861e#h3922861e

Shot with D90 and a Nikon 70-200 2.8 ED lens; 

settings.. 200mm, F4.0, 1/60th shutter and ISO 640

Here's another... just above the feeder. Looks to be a finch? 

Shot with the D90 and 70-200;

settings.. 145mm, F3.2, 1/640th shutter and ISO 320

Ok....so here's some of the pictures from Spring Picture Day at MCCS...

Thank you so much to the parents who allowed us to not only capture their childs images, but also for letting us use them here!!

Did another panorama today

it was a good day for doing absolutely nothing...so I took 21 pictures and stitched them all together to make a backyard panorama.

A little wet spring day 'snapshot'...

You ever wonder as you sit and plan your day what others are actually doing? I mean, this little fella probably doesn't have a lot on his agenda today... just make sure he has food and thats about it. Wow, do we really have too much or what?

Ok, so here is a little bit about the 'Spring Picture Day" we did......

       I felt like I (John) had to write a little bit of how we did the photo shoot at out Church/Christian School...Mt. Calvary Baptist Church and Christian Day School, in Archdale, NC. I don't think some folks really realize all the work that had gone in to taking over 400 pictures, of which 100+ had to be usable for print. We started at 7am, or at least I did, Amy didn't arrive until around 8. I had some retakes of some of the kids that were sick when we did the first 'school pictures', and some of the teachers/coaches. Then it was on to the barrage of outside, naturally-lit, portrait style pictures. My wife, Amy, is very creative and came up with a spot literally right outside the church doors. She used some Dogwood 'clippings' to give highlights to the background and we fill lighted with a golden 42" reflector as needed. At certain times when the sun would peek out, we used a 42" sheer scrim disc to filter out the bright lights. When possible, most shot were taken at a wide open f2.8 to give a greater depth of field. Almost all shots were taken using the Nikon D90 hitched up to the Nikon 80-200 f2.8 beast that I have. All I can say is what a wonderful portrait lens that has turned out to be!
      We had to make just about every shot count as time was extremely limited and Amy wanted to get at least two poses from each of the 74 kids that were there that day. I free handed some, tripod the rest and flashed some with the Nikon SB800. When I get consent, I will try and post some of the kids, that aren't mine here for some examples.
God-Bless,
John and Amy
 

Mt. Calvary Christian School Spring pictures are coming....

Well, it's been a looooong time since our last post, but what free time I do have lately has been used on photo editing and producing. Here's one of our oldest son that we took during the Spring Picture Day at his school, Mt. Calvary Christian School.

I walked out back the other day and heard a hawk 'screaming' and looked up and noticed a pair in a Gum tree and they were eying a nest just over one of our out buildings. Then, in an instance the male hawk leaped down to the nest and seemed to be inspecting and preparing it for the female. It will be interesting to see how this plays out this summer. 

Scroll down for a low resolution video...

This series was shot with the Nikon 80-200 at the full 200mm,  f7.0, ISO 320, 1/1000 sec

VIDEO:

Spring is upon us....

Spring is about here, as you can tell with the hustle and bustle of the birds. I caught a glimpse of this woodpecker  on the Cedar tree the other day..

A well fought battle

Just a 'snap' from our game last Tuesday night against Shining Light Academy in Greensboro. We were on our way to a comeback, scoring 20+ points in the third quarter. Tough game though. Sorry for the lack of photos. It has been so busy, the flu bug has hit, Nicolas has had pink eye, our heat pump went out...and on and on..

Thats 8th grade Daniel Law trying to hit an almost three pointer....and playing on the varsity team!

God's everlasting word

Well, it's been a while to say the least, but I thought I would share a little off subject again. We have had a houseful of sick ones in our home this last week, and had faced adversity in several other ways also. But, I was reminded today in my daily devotion of God's word in just how faithful God is to meet our needs. It took me back to the day I was saved, how God relieved me of my burdens. God wants us to shed our troubles on him. So often I ask myself if the cross I carry is as heavy as the one He bore for all of us? I thought I would snap a picture of what it looks like from my perspective when I take time with God..... Is it ever any wonder at how technology has changed to allow us to preserve images, yet nothing is needed but God himself to preserve His word!

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." John 1:1



Happy New Year 2011

Well, it's has been SO busy for the Arnold clan. First the holidays, then I had jury duty, then back to a busy work week! We will try and get some more pictures up in the next few days. have a great new year!!