Critique of photos requested - SchH trial, A, B, and C phases - Page 1

http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/gsd/pedigree/477754.html

 Folks,

I'd like to get some constructive criticism of some photos I took at our club's fall trial.  I am an amateur photographer, and I never have sold a picture to anyone.  I just do this for fun, and because it delights my club mates to get cool pictures of their dogs in action.

However, I am an amateur and my camera's not top line either, so I'd like to get some input on ways to get better results.  The link above will take you to my dog's page, and under the Photo Galleries is a group called "Favorite SchH Pictures".  That's the group with the trial photos.

All suggestions for improvement of my photo composition skills are welcome.  I'm a thick skinned gal so don't worry about hurting my feelings.  Also, if anyone would like to recommend a nice camera for less than $1,000 I would appreciate that too.

Also, another key point... I keep inadvertently adding the same picture twice and I don't know what's causing that.  I hit the Submit button only once.  Can someone tell me how to delete the duplicate pictures? 

Thanks!

Yvette

P.S.  Photos of workingline dogs and showline dogs!  If the dog works, "it works for me".  :)

Hi!

First of all, I think you Chaco is gorgeous!

I don't know much about photography, but I think your pictures are really good, especially for a novice with a "not so great" camera. :-)

You're right that I had trouble getting the lighting correct.  It was raining off and on in tracking but it cleared up and then the sun was blazing and it was totally screwing with my light/dark balance.  I'm not sure how to compensate when the lighting is harsh like that.  Ideas, anyone?

But do you think my "captions" for the pictures sounded cheesy?  I was trying to put a little write up with each picture but I'm not satisfied with the way it reads.  Is there a better way to word-smith captions like that?

My sister sells Leica cameras. In fact, she is in Germany right now taking some VIPs on some sort of factory tour. Please don't hold me to this, but I believe I've heard my sister talk about adjusting the shutter speed to compensate for the lighting conditions. A slower shutter speed will let in more light when conditions are dark? Like I said, don't hold me to this as I've only heard my sister talk about these things. I could be totally wrong ;-)

Learn to shoot manual, that will help with the auto-focus.

For film, excellent one is Fuji portrait film.  Excellent grain and color.

Some of the best shots I took were with a basic Nikon.  Practice and get a good lens.

I like Niko, but am also looking at Canon for digital.

SKI,

I use a digital camera, and it's a Canon, but more of recreational type camera.  I need to kick it up a notch on the quality scale.

I definitely need to master the manual settings, and I've tried a few times with disappointing results because I'm just guessing at settings.  Do you know of a good reference - book, web site, etc that has some basics?

Photography for Dummies???