Posts in Category: moss and lichen
12/16/2009
Moss
Back to summer for this extreme close up of fresh green moss from this summer. Emmon’s Preserve in Kennebunkport ME is a few acres along a steam protected by the Kennebunk Land Trust. There is a rustic hiking trail that winds through, mostly along the stream. There is always something of interest to photograph there.
This was taken, as you might guess, from right down on the ground, using the flip out LCD on the Sony H50 and the macro setting. I used EV compensation and program shift to get as much depth of field as possible. EV compensation was also useful in taming the highlights in this full sun shot.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent and macro. F3.5 @ 1/60th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto with -.7EV compensation and program shift.
Added Clarity and Vibrance in Lightroom, Blackpoint to the right. Sharpen Landscape preset.
10/5/2009
In China Bay...from China Beach
As I mentioned previously, the stairway down to China Beach was open this year and I was able to climb down for the first time. Amazing place. (See 9/28). This is the headland along the south shore of China Beach with fog rolling behind it.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F5.0 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Recovery in Lightroom for the fog and sky. A good deal of Fill Light to open the shadows on the rock. Blackpoint slightly right. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset. Cropped slightly for composition.
From Monterey Bay 09s.
10/1/2009
Off North Point
Perhaps the only drawback to Point Lobos is that, because it is so popular, it has to be closely managed. You walk on the paths, and the paths, where there is any question, are set off by cable guides. It makes for a “stand here, shoot this” kind of experience at the really good vistas…but then…they are really good vistas! and they have done a good job of putting you where you need to stand to see them to best effect.
However that means that if you shoot wide or try for an alternative composition, you are likely to get a cable guide in the frame. No way around it.
For this shot I backed away to the far side of the path to catch the frame of the lichen covered tree skeleton branches. I am tempted to go into Photoshop and clone out the cable…but then…it is part of the scene too…part of the experience of Point Lobos today. So it says in this time. Maybe later I will change my mind.
And now that I have called your attention too that obtruding cable, I am really hoping that the overall strength of the image will keep folks from noticing it until it is too late to spoil the image for them…if it spoils the image at all.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/800 @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Recovery in Lightroom to bring out the light in the fog. Some Fill Light for the foreground branches. Added Clarity and Vibrance in the Presence panel. Sharpen Landscape preset.
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.
9/6/2009
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.]
7/12/2009
The Rush (Batson River, Emmons Preserve)
We have had a lot of rain this summer, as I may have mentioned, and all the streams are running full. Baston River which runs through the Emmons Preserve (part of the Kennebunk Land Trush system) is no exception. I have photographed it before in spate, and know the challenges from my failures.
This shot is your traditional rushing water between green banks shot. One of the difficulties in shooting at Emmons is the depth of the shadows and the brightness of the light where it does fall through. I am always having to compromise on exposure and manipulate in post processing. This shot, on the other hand, being fairly even in lighting, required only that I change the white balance to cloudy, and use Program Shift to force a slow shutter speed. Community wisdom says that blurred silky water captures the rush better than water frozen in motion by the shutter. Generally a tripod is needed, but with the image stabilization on the H50 you can get away with hand holding.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F7.1 @ 1/6th sec. @ ISO 100. Programed auto, with Program shift.
On the other hand: this is closer to what it looked like. We do not, after all, see silky water anywhere but in photographs. It is an artifact: an attempt to capture the feel rather than the reality of the subject.
The Rush 2
Even in this shot, the low overall illumination under the heavy canopy pushed the shutter speed below water freezing levels, but certainly there is more detail in the water. This is the other extreme, where I used the program shift to select the highest shutter speed possible in this light.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F2.7 @ 1/40th @ ISO 100. Programed auto, with Program shift.
Both had the same post. In Lightroom, Recovery for the highlights in the water and considerable Fill Light to open the shadows. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Landscape sharpen preset.
So my question, both to myself and to you, is: which one do you like better?
I plan a more extensive examination of this subject on Point and Shoot Landscape in the next few days, but what do you think? Which does a better job of capturing the sensation of the rushing water? Which looks more real? (Those might be different answers.) And finally, which is more aesthetically satisfying? To you?
6/28/2009
Infinate Cadillac
Happy Sunday!
This is perhaps an appropriate shot for the last entry from this year’s trip to Acadia. I tried several before getting this low angle, flower and lichen in the foreground, expanse of the rocky top and ziz zag of the environmental fencing, and then leaping out across Frenchman’s bay to the horizon with its clouds. I was trying to capture at least one aspect of Cadillac and Acadia: the sense of being suspended, all life, from the flower struggling against odds to the humans tiny on the near horizon, between the rocky, gritty particular and an awesome infinity. For me, that is an essential element of the Acadia experience.
Practically speaking, I used Program Shift (see In Praise of Program Shift on Point and Shoot Landscape) to get the smallest aperture for greatest depth of field to keep everything from the foreground rock detail and the flower petals to the far horizon relatively sharp. It took me quite a few shots and 20 minutes to find the right flower. F8 on a P&S is pretty deep focus, but I found that I had to put the flower up into the field a bit and let some of the rock go soft right at the bottom of the frame. I cropped out the out of focus area in Lightroom during post processing.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F8.0 @ 1/200th @ ISO 100. Programed auto, program shifted for smallest aperture.
In Lightroom, besides the crop, Recovery for the sky, some Fill Light and added Contrast to compensate in the foreground, added Clarity and Vibrance, and Landscape sharpen preset.
5/13/2009
Hands Off!
While scouting for the World Series of Birding, driving the back streets of Cape May Point, along Lilly Pond, we came upon this fellow attempting to cross the road. Found a place to park the car and of course took some shots. We did try to encourage him out of the street, but he was not having our help (or interference). It was a quiet street had he was pretty safe, but the next day we found a crushed carcass along side a more traveled road, just to prove the danger of being a very large snapping turtle in the spring wander season.
Straightforward tel portrait. Minimal processing in Lightroom: Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen. A bit of added contrast.
Sony DSC H50 at about 400mm equivalent. F4.5 @ 1/400 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto. -.7 EV exposure compensation.
From Cape May 2009.
And for context, the video (taken with the Sanyo TH1, HD camcorder).
4/11/2009
Lichen among the Moss
I did go out yesterday in better light and rework the crocus…but I will save one of those for tomorrow. Today we have a shot from later in the day, from a walk around the never fails me trail at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge. It is only a mile, but I find something interesting to photograph on every visit.
The moss this early spring is the brightest thing in the forest, so vibrantly green and lush that it has to draw the eye. This shot is right down at moss level, with a cluster of lichen breaking though for interest. I left enough background to, hopefully, supply some scale. This is tiny, tiny stuff shot at the closest 2 cm macro of the H50…which is one of the things I really love about this camera (I don’t love everything about it…just enough to keep me carrying it).
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F5.6 @ 1/125 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
In Lightroom I used a graduated filter pulled up from the bottom to pop up the foreground with added clarity and contrast. You could not apply the kinds of levels I used here in standard processing, or to any area without a lot of detail, but as a graduated filter over appropriate areas of the image it gives a pseudo-hdr effect. After applying it I always find I have to increase the brightness of the whole image. That is in addition to my normal Presence adjustments for this camera, plus both Clarity and Vibrance applied globally and the Sharpen portrait preset.
I always feel a need to remind readers that while the above sounds like a lot of processing, Lightroom makes it easy (you can see your effects applied in real time) and fast (all of that took only about 2 minutes, start to finish).
From Rachel Carson Seasons.