Posts in Category: still-life
12/16/2010: Little Things 3
Frost on ice, with a few random leaves on the surface (and many more underneath). This is another shot mostly about textures and subtle colors…and another long range macro (or at least close up) using the macro tele feature on the Canon SX20IS. Of course, carful composition comes into too. 🙂
220mm equivalent @ f5 @ 1/100th @ ISO 400. Programmed auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
12/15/2010: Little things 2
Continuing my series of shots of the small stuff along the way, this lonely feather lying in the path beside an oak leaf caught my eye. Feather texture is always interesting to me and the juxtaposition here, with the contrast between the sandy surface, and the smooth cellular oak leaf, drew my eye in. When you add the range of subtle color, it has me caught. What you might call a found still life.
I can only guess at the species of the bird…something fairly large from the size, and something that would be prey to a bigger bird or maybe a fox, from the look of it. Possibly a Blue Jay. [Srdjan Cuturilov on Facebook thinks it is a Morning Dove feather…which, all things considered, it very likely! Thanks Srdjan!]
Canon SX20IS @ 375mm equivalent and macro, f5 @ 1/250th @ ISO 400. Programmed auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom (see page link above).
11/17/2010: feathers
I wanted to give you a break from digisocped birds this morning (or maybe I wanted one myself) but going back through the images on my SX20IS I am reminded that no one goes to the Rio Grande Valley of Texas for the scenery.
This little still life, perhaps a bit sad unless you can see the larger picture of nature at work, comes from my largely fruitless trip to a Photo ranch on the north edge of the Valley, where I hoped to photograph larger wildlife. There is beauty in this random scatter of feathers, in the fine details and the pattern. I think they might be Pyrrloxia, and are undoubtedly the remains of a Sharp Shinned Hawk meal.
Canon SX20IS at about 290mm equivalent (zoomed in for the detail) @ f5.0 @ 1/200th @ ISO 200. Landscape program.
Processed in Lightroom with a bit of Recovery, Fill Light, Blackpoint right, added Clarity and Vibrance, and Sharpen narrow edges preset.
5/20/2010
Found Still Life
Another shot grabbed in passing during the rush of the World Series of Birding. Grabbed is, of course, an misnomer. There is a state you get too in your photography where a lot can happen in the second it takes to frame and shoot. A whole set of complex decisions are compressed so tightly that it feels like instinct or reflex. See photo, shoot photo. Move on. It can happen in a second, and in the middle of doing something else altogether…like documenting the World Series of Birding. 🙂
I liked the big leaves. I liked the yellow flowers. Then I saw them against the fallen log with the vines. I saw what the light was doing. I stepped off the side of the camp road, zoomed in a bit for framing, and shot.
Canon SX20IS at 112mm equivalent. F4.5 @ 1/13th @ ISO 200. Landscape program.
In Lighroom, a touch of Fill Light and Blackpoint just right. Added Clarity and a very small amount of Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset.
4/18/2010
Daff on the Rocks
Happy Sunday.
This lonely Daffodil, posed against a granite bolder with its lichen in my daughter’s piano teacher’s yard, somewhat caged by dry stems, caught my eye. The bright yellow, the vibrant green, the texture of the stone and the delicate tracery of the weeds. This is another shot that employs the long end of the macro zoom on the SX20IS to good advantage.
Canon SX20IS at 560mm equivalent and macro. F5.7 @ 1/400th @ ISO 200. Programmed auto.
In Lightroom, some Recovery for the yellow in the Daff, a touch of Fill Light to offset Blackpoint to the right, added Clarity and just a tiny amount of Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Around Home 2010.
4/15/2010
Bryant Park Color
I had a few moments between the training I am doing and a dinner engagement, so I walked over to Bryant Park, a few blocks from our hotel. It was a beautiful spring day in the city after a hard winter and the park was well populated with New Yorkers enjoying. They are in the middle of a restoration project that includes the lawns and flower plantings. This little juxtaposition was played out in varieties all around the boarder of the park under the trees. Of course, what caught my eye here was the contrast in color and shape.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. F2.8 @ 1/30th @ ISO 80. Programmed auto.
Light processing in Lightroom. Added Clarity and just a little Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset.
From NYC 2010.
3/24/2010
Tender Color (or not)
Off a lobster boat in Cape Porpoise harbor, Cape Porpoise ME. Lobster buoys are traditionally colorful, but lobster boats are just as traditionally white with black trim. This lobsterman clearly things differently, from the slogan/name on the back of the boat to the brilliant color scheme. This is a case where having the reach of a super-zoom Point and Shoot makes the day, as I was able to isolate the boat against the water. Cropping top and bottom finished the presentation.
Canon SX20IS at 560mm equivalent. F5.7 @ 1/640th @ ISO 80. Landscape program.
In Lightroom, cropping as above. A touch of Recovery. A tiny amount of Fill Light. Blackpoint to the right. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Around Home 2010.
10/2/2009
Splender in the Weeds
Still at Point Lobos from my visit last Sunday, but something a bit different. It would not do to get lost in the view and the drama of the fog blowing in, and miss the little details at your feet. Or so I say. As always the Sony H50s flip out LCD and super macro setting makes shots like this easy. Flip out, hold low and close, frame, shoot when it looks good.
I am not sure what this is, but the contrast between the spiky balls and the creamy pendants behind was arresting in reality, and makes, I think, a find study as an image.
Sony DSC H50 at about 40mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/320th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just my most basic added Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen landscape preset in Lightroom.
From Monterey Bay 09.
9/10/2009
Deep Forest Green
Sometimes it is mostly about color…color enhanced by contrast in this case. The green of forest moss is always intense enough to almost provide a subject in itself, but here, in contrast to the exposed rust of the broken log and the more subtle browns of the fallen leaves, it really catches the eye. Add the rock in the foreground for accent, and put the log across the frame as a strong diagonal (connecting rule of third horizons) and you have, to my eye, an interesting image. To frame it this way, I used the flip-out LCD of the H50 and held the camera about at knee level.
Sony DSC H50 at about 45mm equivalent. F2.8 @ 1/50th @ ISO 200. Programed auto. -1EV exposure compensation to hold the highlights in the forest background.
Even so, Recovery in Lightroom for those same highlights. A touch of Fill Light and Blackpoint to the right for intensity. Added Vibrance and Clarity in the Presence panel. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Rachel Carson Seasons.
9/7/2009
Green
Happy Labor Day!
Do you ever get the feeling “it is time to make an image”? No particular reason, and you don’t really feel like going anywhere photogenic, but it is time to find something to take a picture of? That feeling?
It hit the other day. So I took a walk around the yard to see what I could find.
Thinking about it, it  is not really your shutter finger that is itchy…it is your eye…you photographic eye…the eye that sees images. If you don’t exercise it it regularly you begin to feel the need. It was not that I went out looking for an image:  I went out to look for an image. It is the looking that matters…or at least, that matters as much as the image itself.
So, there were these tomatoes…green tomatoes…and the light was doing good things with them. I took a series of shots. I like this one.
The whole process took about 15 minutes. I went out. Didn’t go anywhere really. Just the yard. Exercised my eye. Came back feeling a whole lot better.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F2.7 @ 1/60th @ ISO 100. Programed auto. -.7EV exposure compensation.
Even with the -.7EV I used Recovery in Lightroom for the highlights. Moved the blackpoint right. Added Clarity and Vibrance in the Presence panel. Sharpen landscapes preset.
From The Yard.