30 Day Photo Challenge: Day 1 - Self Portrait

So I'm starting a 30-day photo challenge with my friend Annie to get me out of my comfort level and get me practicing with some of the settings outside my comfort level on my new DSLR camera.  We will share pictures on Instagram or Facebook, but I also wanted to document here as well so I could remember what obstacles I was dealing with when choosing different settings.

Day 1 - A Self Portrait

What?  Not every day involves bokeh and taking pictures of my baby??  This challenge is already challenging me to get outside my comfort zone.  Who knew that self-portraits with DSLRs were so difficult?  Well, they're enormous cameras with no front-view, so I guess it's somewhat obvious.  

I went two different directions with my self-portrait.  One I took in front of a mirror, and the other I went outside and held the camera in my left arm as far away from my body as I could, and took about 8 billion pictures swirling around in a circle because I wasn't sure where the light was.  

With both photos, I gradually pushed by aperture up from f/1.8 until I got the focal length I thought looked best.  

For the picture outside, I took the ISO off auto after awhile, and set it at 800 because I wanted a brighter picture than the auto setting was giving me, so the background is a little grainy.  The ISO is super high on the mirror photo.  I knew I was putting this in black and white, and I like a little grain in BW so I didn't bother meddling.  I would have had to go full manual mode and bring the shutter speed down to adjust for exposure, and I'm not ready for full manual yet.  

For the photo in the mirror, I set the focus on my left eye, and then flipped the photo post-production so the Canon label wasn't reading backwards.  For the photo outside, since I was taking it in true selfie style, I put it on auto-focus and hoped for the best!  

Both photos were taken with my 50mm lens in Aperture mode.  Some day, my goal is to shoot in manual mode, but Day 1 of my photo challenge is not the day.  

f/4.5, 1/80s, ISO:3200

f/4.0, 1/2000s, ISO:800