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January: Highlight Reel, 1

Hi and welcome to the first Highlight Reel of 2020! We have been so incredibly blow away by the amount of participation we have seen so far this year. It's truly amazing. There are so many new faces and I am excited to get to know you all this year and see where this project takes you!


In following with P52 tradition, we have kicked off yet another year with low light. I have seen some hesitation with this theme and many questions have been asked and answered. I would really like to take a moment to encourage those struggling. For me, looking back, I can pin point the exact moment my photography really started to take an upturn towards where I am today and that was struggling through low light here 3 years ago. We are all on a journey and I still have a ways to go to get to where I want to be, but I truly believe that this project and specifically this theme was a huge turning point for me. So, please, stick with it. I believe in you and am excited to see what this year brings.


I am thrilled to share the following images with you! Enjoy!



Gear: Nikon d750/ Sigma Art 35mm 1.4 Settings: 1/160. ISO 4000 f/2.5 The Shot: Shot at 8:23am, but had blinds closed so only light was from the projector. All lights were turned on (has a setting with 3 lights) and not revolving. Post Processing: Smal10, grain removed, adjusted shadows, highlights, contrast and some noise reduction... because well, 4000 ISO

Gear: SonyA7iii + 24mm Sigma Art Settings: 1/125, f/1.8, ISO 400. The Shot: Shot in the AM around 9:30, curtains open just slightly to get slight light in. Post Processing: SMAL Rose 03, adjust exposure, added warmth, played with shadows, vignette.

Gear: Sony a7iii and Sony 28-70 Settings: 28mm 1/200 f/3.5 iso 1250 The Shot: Spent the morning at a local skating rink/arcade and I love playing with the low light there. So many colors and fun lights Post Processing: Edited only in Lightroom, used smal01, removed grain and matte, used radial filters and highlights brush to make my subject pop


Gear: Nikon D750, Sigma Art 35mm

Settings: ISO 400, 1/4000, f1.4,

The Shot: I closed the blinds to get low light and this was peeking through. Put my son in the light and exposed for my highlights.

Post Processing: Cropped a little in lightroom and lightened my sons eye for drama. Used SMAL 01 with tweeks.


Gear: Nikon D750. Nikkor 50mm 1,8. Settings: 1/2500 f6,3 ISO100. The Shot: External flash with a shoot through umbrella. sitting on my bed with my hair dryer and remote trigger. Post Processing: Converted to black and white. some dodge and burn to create contrast. overall increased contrast and clarity, S-curve, and some grain


Gear: Pixel 3a, 4mm, f 1.8 Settings: 1/4 sec, ISO 300. Coaadition and Night Sight processing. The Shot: Handheld using tripod stance at the edge of the lake. Post Processing: Edited in Lightoom for mobile. Dropped the shadows and blacks, increased saturation of blues and altered the hue to decrease the acqua and up the purple for a more serene feeling. Cloned out two airplanes and some near field grass in the water. Hand dodged highlights in clouds slightly to increase the interest and contrast.

Gear: Nikon D750 with 24-70 Nikon shot at 24 . Settings: 1/60 |f2.8 |ISO640 The Shot: We had just arrived at our rented cabin and were unpacking. I saw him sitting like this and stopped in my tracks and grabbed my camera. Post Processing: Edited with Soulmate presets. smal01.

Gear: Canon 5D Mark III - 35 mm sigma Art

Settings: F2.2 - 1/250 - Iso 125 The Shot: Taken in the woods with back light. Post Processing: Edited in LR Classic with personnal preset.

Gear: Canon Rebel T6 - 35 mm Settings: ISO 800 f/2.0 1/1600 The Shot: my little one just plopped herself down in this afternoon light so I grabbed my camera as quickly as I could. the light is coming from a window to her left. Post Processing: Edited in lightroom. Used SMAL 01 preset as a base. Dropped the midtones on the tone curve. Decreased the blacks, warmed it up a bit, and lowered the exposure on the basket and the wall on the left of the photo.


Gear: Canon 5D Mark iii 35mm 1.4 Settings: f1.4 1/5000 ISO 800 The Shot: I photographed the light from the blinds in my hallway. Post Processing: I added luminance in ACR and then used a gradient map to convert to B/W in PS.

Gear: Nikon D750 | 100mm Settings: F 5.3 | 1/100 The Shot: I shot this outside on an overcast day. I like to underexpose my images a bit to create a darker look. Post Processing: I edited in Photoshop using two images to focus stack. I used a couple of presets along with some hand edits.

Gear: Nikon D750 and 50mm 1.8D lens Settings: 1/400, F/2.2, ISO 800 The Shot: Handheld in kitchen with the light from the window coming in from the left. Post Processing: Edited with SMAL04, removed grain, increased contrast and clarity, slight increase in exposure, lowered highlights

Loryn Payne

Gear: 5D Mark iii, Sigma Art 35mm 1.4 Settings: ISO 500 | f/4.5 | 1/250

The Shot: This was first thing in the morning. My oldest came running into our room while visiting my in-laws and said, "Mom, you have to grab your camera and come take my picture of the most beautiful sunrise ever." Done, little guy. Post Processing: Edited in LR: dropped highlights and whites, increased shadows and blacks, added contrast, and brushes over the snow to get rid of pink color cast from the sunrise.

Gear: Nikon d850 & Nikon 24-70 f2.8 2.

Settings: ISO 3200, 1/80, f2.8.

The Shot: NYE with sparklers, super dark outside on our porch, only light source was hanging lights and sparklers.

Post Processing: Edit-Image was super dark to begin with. Began in Lightroom for initial edit-brought up shadows and highlights. Increased Luminance. Bring into PS where I run various GTG actions including a slight painterly. Corrected some orange skin ton and ran a few anti noise actions as well.


Gear: Nikon d 750, sigma 35 mm Settings: F2.8, 1/80, iso 400 The Shot: The kids wanted to play shadow puppets on this dreary day - I stood on the couch next to them and snapped a shot of them making shapes Post Processing: Edited in Lightroom

Stacy Lemm

Gear: Cannon 7D Mark II 18-55mm 4.0 lens (my old kit lens) set at 24mm Settings: IOS 400 f/5.0 1/800s The Shot: late morning light in a dark room. I opened my blackout blinds to let the dappled light come in and left all other light sources off. Exposed for the highlights from the sun on her white sweater. Post Processing: In Lightroom I adjusted white balance, pulled up the exposure. I used a brush to add more exposure to her face and used a brush with mask on to pull down some of the exposure on the highlights. Finally I used LXCN 01 H preset.


Gear: Nikon

Settings: f/1.8 1/1600 ISO 300

The Shot: Shot in a pocket of light with a copper pipe for the flare.

Post Processing: Edited in LR with Smal Rose presets and temp/exposure adjustments and brought into photoshop to refine details.

Gear: Nikon D750, 35mm 1.8 Nikon Nikkor Lens

Settings: 500 shutter, 1.8, ISO 640...

The Shot: taken in my daughter's bedroom. I pulled the curtains open just enough to get the light on her pigtails.

Post Processing: I lowered highlights, boosted contrast, upped whites a bit and lowered blacks a bit, and cropped the photo to just have her pigtails and forehead instead of her whole face.


Gear: Canon EOS R, 35mm Canon lens Settings: f/1.8, 1/160, ISO 1000 The Shot: silhouette with fire as the only light source Post Processing: Edited in Lightroom with SMAL 06

Gear: Nikon D7100 + Nikon 35mm f1.8 lens Settings: f3.2 1/320 sec, iso 200 The Shot: This is 2 of my 3 daughters helping me out with a photo assignment. They were spinning on top of a hill and I was shooting from down below them just as the sun had set. Post Processing: Edited in LR. Pulled down the shadows and blacks to remove the detail from their clothing and faces, and lowered highlights to take out any bright areas. Also lowered the white balance to enhance the blue light of twilight hour.



Gear: Canon 70D + Sigma Art 35mm 1.4 Settings: SS: 1/200. f/2.2. ISO 400 The Shot: I shot this using a tripod with minimal light coming from my bedroom window on an overcast morning. Post Processing: I took two photos into Lightroom, did minor adjustments on exposure, shadows and highlights before converting to bnw. I took the images into PS and removed some distractions. I overlayed the photos and unchecked the red in the blend options. Added a film texture and took back into Lightroom to tweak it to my usual settings.

Cortney Lang

Gear: Sony A7iii - 35mm sigma Settings: ISO 640 F2.0 1/250 Post Processing: Edited with SMAL 01

I had to really cool it off as this image is lit by a bedside table lamp on a dim switch. She was about 2ft from the lamp and I used AWB! I added a touch of matte to the image as well. Did minimal adjustments in LR and then color and lighting adjustments in PS. I brought down the highlights to keep them soft, did a hue saturation layer for skin tone and did a levels layer to give it some heavier depth and sharpened!


Gear: Nikon D850, Lensbaby Edge 50 Settings: ISO 320, 1/160 The Shot: Shot close to one of our windows. Post Processing: Editing with T&O preset, with hand edits.

Gear: Canon 5D mkIII, Canon 16-35mm,

Settings: f4.5, exp 1/2000, ISO 3200.

The Shot: I basically saw a swarm of birds in the parking lot as my girls and I were heading into gymnastics. I had my camera with me because we had just come from taking real estate pics. I told my oldest to run at the birds and they took off! It was basically what I was hoping they would do.

Post Processing: I brought out colors in the sunset a bit more, sharpened and, and cropped out the parking lot portion of the image and added the black upper and bottom canvas to give it a movie look. I also cloned out a couple baseball field lights.


Gear: Canon 70d, 35mm f2,

Settings: iso 2000, 1/60s, f2.5.

The Shot: This was shot on the old cobbled streets of Edinburgh on our way to the theatre to watch the lion king. It was pitch black and the only light was from the old fashioned street lights, so I made sure to get my son under the light so that it just hit the top of his hat. I also lived the curve of all the windows lit up behind him in the old terrace houses and the traditional iron railings. It screams Edinburgh to me.

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