Posts in Category: weather
3/13/2010
Tide Pools Area: Cabrillo National Monument
Cabrillo National Monument sits at the point of Point Loma, overlooking San Diego Harbor on one side, and the Pacific on the other. There is a lighthouse there, and little pocket park, with some of the best views of the coast you are likely to see. You have to drive through a section of the Naval Base and the National Cemetery to get there, so access is limited to 9 to 5 (when the military gates are open these days) but it is always worth a visit, in any season and any weather.
The day I had available dawned, as promised, with rain, and I debated going at all. I did get out, and had about 3 hours there, shooting from under my umbrella and in brief intervals in the drizzle, before a steady driving rain drove me off the point and back to the hotel.
This is the Tide Pool area, which is reached by a well paved and graded road that serves both the modern lighthouse and a water treatment plant. They have been working here in the last year, making improvements on the short trail system, and I enjoyed exploring further from the parking lot than I have ventured in the past.
The challenge in this weather is, of course, to capture the authentic drama of the rainy coast, cliffs and ocean. The contrast and exposure (EV) range is surprisingly broad on such a day, dull as we might think it, as the lighter sky tends to dominate the dark, rain soaked, landscape. More on that in a Point & Shoot Landscape post (coming soon).
I took a couple of different shots of this view before I got the balanced rocks where they needed to go. This image required some creative work in Lightroom…or maybe I should say, a bit more work than my usual 1 minute adjustments.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. F4 @ 1/250th @ ISO 80. Landscape Program. (For more on Landscape Program see the P&S piece mentioned above.)
In Lightroom, Recovery for the sky, Fill Light for the foreground. Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Reduced Brightness overall. Reduced Contrast. Graduated Filter effect pulled down diagonally from the top right corner across the top half of the image to reduce exposure even more for the bright area of clouds. Sharpen landscape preset.
From San Diego 2010.
3/5/2010
Little River Marsh in Winter Dress
I am hoping this particular view, dressed as it is, is soon a memory I won’t have to revisit for at least 6 months…and of course, this particular combination of storm clouds, snowy landscape, snow frosted trees, and cusp of spring light is unlikely to ever occur again. This is another shot I took too off. The other view is at the bottom and I can’t really decide which I like best. Though they are the same exact vista, the are very different images. To my eye at least.
Canon SX20IS at about 85mm equivalent. F4 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto, biased just slightly for the sky.
Some Recovery for the sky, and Fill Light for the foreground. Only a touch of Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and a tiny amount of Vibrance. Exposure increased slightly for the snow.
From Around Home 2010.
And here is the other view.
This one is at 28mm equivalent, F4 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto as above. Processing as above. In this one the sky is more the subject than the land.
1/26/2010
More Reno Mountains
Another view of the mountains above Reno from the 8th floor of the Atlantis. Zoomed in for framing.
Sony DSC H50 at about 150mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/160th @ ISO100. Programmed auto.
Added Clarity and Vibrance in Lightroom. Blackpoint right. Sharpen landscape preset. Cropped from the bottom for composition.
From the Reno gallery on weiw.lightshedder.com.
1/25/2010
Reno Mountains
My suspicion is that Reno does not look this dramatic all the time. The snow on the mountains undoubtedly adds a dimension to the folded hills and mountains behind the cityscape. This is the view from an 8th floor window at the Atlantis Casino. Reno is impossible to photograph…or at lest the dramatic vistas with mountains, are impossible to photograph from street level since there are no unobstructed views…and, unlike Vegas which is continuous (and calculated) eyecandy, the architecture in Reno is, I am sorry, ugly. Oh, there are probably sticking buildings there somewhere, but certainly nothing I could reach on foot or see from the Atlantis. So…window shots.
Sanyo VPC CG10 at 38mm equivalent. F4.7 @ 1/450th @ ISO 50. Programmed auto. (The CG10 is an HD video camera with a 10 mega pixel CMOS senor, and can be set for 16/9 stills like this one at 7.5 mega pixels.)
Added Clarity and Vibrance in Lightroom. Blackpoint right. Sharpen landscapes preset. Some Recovery for the clouds and a touch of Fill Light for the shadows. Cropped from the bottom to improve composition and eliminate distracting clutter.
From Reno.
1/22/2010
Treasure Island Under Snowy Mountains
Another shot from an interesting dawn in Vegas.
Sony DSC H50 at 120mm equivalent. F3.5 @ 1/13th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Recovery in Lightroom for the sky and snow. Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Sharpen Landscape preset.
From Las Vegas 2010
1/21/2010
Fog in the Valley, Snow on the Mountains, Sunrise, Vegas
A Twitter friend was apparently watching the weather channel and saw the report of a rare fog in Las Vegas and twittered me to ask if I was photographing it. I had not yet opened the drapes of my 18th floor room overlooking Vegas and a corner of the strip. When I did, the sun was just rising…the mountains behind Treasure Island were covered with snow and the valley was indeed filled with fog. I took many shots.
This one required a good deal of perspective and distortion correction in PhotoShop Elements using the Camera Distortion filter…after my normal processing in Lightroom: Blackpoint right, Fill Light, Clarity and Vibrance, and Sharpen Landscape.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F2.7 @ 1/20th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Not your usual view of Vegas.
From Las Vegas 2010.
11/25/2009
the River Lahn, Wetzlar
The Lahn runs through north west Germany for many miles, and is a famous canoeing river. In summer it is common to see parties of canoes working their way down the series of rapids and falls as the river passes between old Town Wetzlar and the new, and there are docks and ramps and tie-up points all along. This image was captured from one of the canoe docks, just downriver from the floating bridge (only deployed in summer) and just upriver from the famous stone bridge to Old Town. In the background you see the Leica plants. The reeds in the foreground are common reed (phragmities)…found around the globe. You can see the park along the Lahn on the far side of the river…this park runs most of the length of Wetzlar on one side of the river or the other.
No special challenges in this shot, other than the low light levels and the reeds blowing in the wind. I took several shots to catch them where I wanted them in the frame.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F3.5 @ 1/60th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Recovery in Lightroom for the stormy sky. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Blackpoint to the right. A tiny bit of Fill Light for the foreground. Sharpen Landscape preset.
From Germany 2009.
11/11/2009
Gulls Below the Surf
The gull standing were such a great subject, I was tempted to get down to sand level and see how they looked with the surf as a background. I was surprised at how high it rose above them. Moderate tel to compress the image planes, and tight cropping top and bottom emphasizes the horizontal lines of the image.
Sony DSC H50 at about 315mm equivalent. F4.5 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Cropped in Lightroom. Some Recovery for the sky an surf highlights. Blackpoint well to the right. Added Clarity and Vibrance and the Sharpen Landscapes preset.
From Around Home Kennebunk ME.
11/2/2009
Morning Marsh, Mackerel Sky, Drawing Water Sun
A very difficult image to expose and process. But who could resist the morning light, the pond, the sky, the reflections? One of the best parts of birding, as far as I am concerned is that it gets me out to places like this at times like this.
I am still not totally happy with the exposure on this image. I needed to catch the drawing water rays, so the foreground was way too dark. You can only do so much manipulation in software. This is a case where multiple exposures processed for HDR might have produced better results.
Still…it is what it is, and I think it catches the mood.
Sony DSC H50 at about 60mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto. Exposure read favoring the sky by tipping the camera up and locking exposure.
Heavy Recovery and Fill Light in Lightroom. Blackpoint slightly right. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen Landscape preset.
From Cape May 10/09.
Okay…had some time this am so I opened LightZone (for the first time in months) just to see what I could do with this difficult image with the tools there. This is maybe a bit over the top…processed for maximum drama. But it certainly is an alternative view.
As above: but with drama! LightZone treatment.
10/20/2009
Back to the Fall in Maine
From my photo-jaunt out to my favorite fall spot, along the Mousam River in West Kennebunk, a few miles from home. Still that same moody day. Trying for extreme depth on this one.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm apparent. F8.0 @ 1/100th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Some Recovery in Lightroom for the sky and reflections. Blackpoint slightly right. Added Vibrance and Clarity. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Fall 09 Maine.