Posts in Category: tree
3/31/2010
Landscape on Bark
From the sweeping grandeur of panoramas and beach vistas, we go to the miniature landscape of lichen, moss, and fungus on a tree trunk. I have always been fascinated by the patterns to be seen close in. The full range macro on the SX20 makes shots like this easier to frame and capture. As with the big vistas of the past few days, to see this to full advantage you need to click the image and open it at a larger size. And, finally, it is pretty good image quality from a small sensor super zoom at ISO 200!
Canon SX20IS at about 250mm equivalent and Macro. F5 @ 1/160th @ ISO 250. Programmed auto.
In Lightroom, Blackpoint right, added Clarity and a touch of Vibrance. Sharpen landscapes preset.
From Around Home 2010.
3/29/2010
Laudholm Pond Panorama
I have a detailed explanation of why and how this shot was taken at Playing With Panoramas: sort of… on Point & Shoot Landscape. I was not really after the panorama effect, but I wanted a wider shot than my 28mm equivalent could provide, in order to frame the pond and sky with the white birch stands. Three shots using the Panorama mode on the SX20IS with the zoom at about 40mms, PhotoShop Elements’ PhotoMerge tool, plus final processing in Lightroom, yields this. Of course, to see it to true advantage you need to click the image and open it in the largest size you monitor will show. For comparison, here is the shot with the unaided 28mm on the Canon SX20IS.
From Around Home 2010.
3/12/2010
Pepper Tree
Last year when I was in San Diego I asked what this flowering tree was, and was told it was a Pepper Tree. Research since has shed some doubt on that id. It is a large tree, maple size at full growth, and the flowers come out before the leaves. This is a shot of one of the flower clusters, which form at the ends of branches. This cluster is about 4-5 inches in diameter. I could only get this close due to the 560mm equivalent lens on the Canon.
Canon SX20IS at 560mm eqivalent. F5.7 @ 1/60th @ ISO 160. Programmed auto.
Blackpoint just barely right in Lightroom. Added Clarity and a touch of Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset. Cropped slightly for composition.
Here are a few more images. If anyone can positively identify the tree, I would appreciate the info.
10/27/2009
Trees of Flame Framing Lighthouse: Cape May
You may get tired of this Lighthouse, but I seem to have shot it from all angles on this trip. I could not resist these very bright trees and finding an angle that would frame the the lighthouse. I got down low and used the flip out lcd of the H50 to compose the shot.
Sony DSC H50 at 35mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/400 @ ISO 100. Programmed Auto.
Recovery in Lightroom for the sky. A bit of fill light to pick up the leaves in the tree and the textures of the tree trunks. Blackpoint to the right to intensify the image. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Sharpen Landscapes preset. Finally I went in with the selective HLS tools and increased the luminance of the red of the leaves.
And, for contrast, here is a shot with more lighthouse and less trees, taken from the same spot by zooming in.
Tighter Frame of Flame
This is at 120mm equivalent. For this shot I used Program Shift on the H50 (easy to do as it is one of the on screen options accessible without opening the menu system) to select the smallest aperture and increase depth of field to keep both foreground and the lighthouse in focus. It received very similar treatment in Lightroom.
So what do you think. Wide frame or tight?
From Cape May 10/09
9/6/2009
Tree Abstraction
Happy Sunday!
I have been back from England for a week more or less…but this is the first image from home. Rachel Carson NWR and the little 1 mile trail there never fails. It was late in the day and it is getting late in the season. I was surprised, when processing these images, to see how low the light levels really were. I guess summer really is over here in Maine.
This is just light on bark and lichen, but it builds an interesting image: a found abstraction. Lots of texture and detail, and yet a strong simple form.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F2.7 @ 1/60th @ ISO 100. Programed auto. -1EV exposure compensation.
Simple added Clarity and Vibrance in Lightroom. Blackpoint to the right. A bit of Fill Light. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Rachel Carson Seasons.
8/15/2009
Deep in the Green
Emmon’s Preserve, managed by the Kennebunk Land Trust, is one of my favorite places to photograph. It is also one of the most difficult. A river runs through it 😉 under a solid canopy of maples and pines, and depending on the weather can be anything from a trickle down over rocks and through pools to a raging torrent. The light is very tricky. Lots of shadow, from open to deep, and shafts of full sun illumination random patches of vegetation, a rock here and there, and select passages in the stream…often a single curl of water around a stone. It is any exposure system’s worst nightmare. Then too, the light is green in the shadows which gives most white balance automation fits.
And it is beautiful with an almost mystical beauty.
So I go back again and again to try again and again to capture what I see and feel there…with never any more than limited success.
This shot comes from an area of the Preserve I only discovered on my last visit. I don’t know how I missed it all these years, but a side trail loops up over a small ridge and comes back down to the river above the rapids and pools I know so well. This section is quieter, but with its own beauty.
Sony DCS H50 at full wide (31mm equivalent). F3.2 @ 1/60th @ ISO 100. Programed auto with -.7EV exposure compensation to tame the highlights.
Even with the exposure compensation, an image like this requires post-processing. Heavy Recovery was needed to bring out any detail in the brighter areas back among the trees, and Fill Light was needed to open the shadows. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Landscape sharpen.
I have mentioned before that post-processing in situations like this is not used to save an incorrectly exposed image. In the field you expose the image knowing what you can and will do to it in Lightroom. You expose it differently than you might if Lightroom were not available. -.7 EV is not enough to bring out detail in the highlights, and yet it makes the shadows too dark, obscuring detail there. -.7EV is, however, the correct place to begin expanding the dynamic range with the tools available in Lightroom. All but the brightest highlights can be brought back in range by Recovery, and the Fill Light tool does a good job of selectively opening the shadows. You have to know this when making the exposure in the field. In a sense you see the image as it will be after post-processing, and expose for that.
It is easier than it sounds, since, with the EV adjustment, the Programed auto on the H50 produces an excellent, well balanced, beginning exposure. If I ever switch cameras (realistically when I switch cameras) I am going to have to learn to do this all over again.
And Emmon’s Preserve is there, always willing to teach me.
[An expanded version of this post, with more on learning to expose for post, will appear on Point and Shoot Landscape in the next few days.]
7/8/2009
Reflect on This
I am always struck by this stand of trees, and on a day like this, when the reflection is at least as interesting as the trees themselves, it makes a powerful, but peaceful image.
Sony DSC H50 at about 60mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/500 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
Cropped heavily from the bottom and, mostly, top in Lightroom for composition. Recovery for the sky. Much Fill Light to bring up detail in the shadows of the trees. Blackpoint to the right more than usual. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Landscape sharpen preset.
6/20/2009
The Bubbles over Jordan Pond
You may recognize this as essentially the same view of the Pond and Bubbles as we saw yesterday. (We will be spending some time around the pond the next few days as I work through the views from this trip.) This image was taken from the same spot as yesterday’s, but this time I zoomed in to about 100mm equivalent to show the detail of the interesting clouds behind the mountains, and to make it essentially a composition in blue and green. This is still a landscape, but more compressed. What it loses in majesty it gains in intensity. Or that’s the theory.
Sony DSC H50 at about 100mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/1000 @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
In Lightroom I applied Recovery for the sky, to bring out cloud detail and increase contrast between the blue and white. Recovery especially helps in cases like this, where you have layered clouds. Clarity and Vibrance also increased the molding of the clouds, and brought out more detail in the trees and the stone of the mountain. (Brought out…that is to say that the information is already there in the digital file. These manipulations do not add anything to the image, they simply adjust relative values to make what you are interested in more visible in the final image.) Landscape sharpen preset.
6/19/2009
Overlooking Jordan Pond from the Pond House Lawn
The Jordan Pond House in Acadia National Park is justly famous for two things: its popovers (gotta be eaten to be believed) and its view. Lunch or dinner on the Jordan Pond House lawn (seating for a hundred or more at tables with individual umbrellas), on any day when it is not actually raining, is, like the popovers, an experience not to be missed. Jordan Pond stretches away below the lawn and the blueberry patch and the Bubbles (two smallish mountains by Acadia standards…big rocks by western standards), rise up behind. Weather comes down the deep valley of Eagle Lake behind the Bubbles and makes for interesting skies. Scenic or what.
I have photographed the Pond and Bubbles in just about every light, at different times of year, but this is actually the first image I have taken from the vantage of the lawn. I was actually sitting on the ground a the edge of the lawn when something about the sky and the bit of weedy grass in the foreground just caught my attention this trip and I took 10 or more exposures at various heights above the ground (between on it, and a foot off it) in an attempt to capture the depth of the view. The low angle was also necessary because there were people continuously walking down a path that runs along the trees on the left, below this near horizon, and people on the path along the lake at the foot of the hill. This shot works for me. You will see some other treatments of this view in coming days.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F5.6 @ 1/500th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
In Lightroom, I used Recovery for the sky, moved the blackpoint to the right slightly, and added both Clarity and Vibrance. I added a bit of contrast, and used the Landscape sharpen preset.
5/11/2009
Abstract Tree
The wet and the rainy day light deepened the saturation of all colors, especially the greens, making this tree bard into a living abstract. Underexposed slightly (-1.3 EV exposure compensation) for effect, and then brought back up selectively in Lightroom. Cropped slightly in the right to improve composition.
Sony DSC H50 at about 80mm equivalent. F3.2 @ 1/100 @ ISO 200. Programed Auto, -1.3 EV exposure compensation.
As above in Lightroom. Added Clarity and Vibrance in Presence panel. Landscape sharpen preset.
From Central Park.