Posts in Category: reflections
5/14/2009
Pond with Pollen
Lighthouse Pond on Cape May Point. Swirls of weed below the water and pollen on the surface provide foreground interest in this low angle shot of the pond. Sky reflections give the water further out an interesting texture. And I like the sculpted shapes of the trees along the far shore. Though this is clearly an suburban pond (no way to hid the houses all along the back side) it still has a wild feel (at least to me).
Sony DSC H50 at about 42mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/600 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
In Lightroom, I used a graduated filter effect from the top to darken the sky, increase contrast in the houses slightly, and bring out the wispy clouds…and then another gfe from the bottom to adjust exposure slightly and add Clarity and Contrast. My usual added Vibrance and Clarity in the Presence panel, and the Landscape sharpen preset.
From Cape May 2009.
5/12/2009
Central Park Boathouse (with rock)
One last shot from my rainy morning stroll in Central Park. This might be a study in contrast…the massive rock ledge, the pillared upright architecture of the boathouse, and the ephemeral reflections in the morning still water…or it might be a study of shape and texture, again drawing out the varied surfaces and the geometry of the different components. Or it might be a study in the way light reacts in a wet world with the things it illuminates. In the end it is nothing more (or less) than a second of time, a particular angle, a juxtaposition of elements that caught my eye, and still catches it.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F4.0 @ 1/125 @ ISO 100. Programed auto. -.7 EV.
Minimal processing in Lightroom. Vibrance, Clarity, and Sharpen.
From Central Park.
5/10/2009
Along by the Boathouse, Central Park
Another shot from my brief photo time in Central Park, NYC, on a rainy morning. Just shapes really, and light, emphasized by the tight crop.
Sony DSC H50 at about 150 mm equivalent. F3.5 @ 1/125 @ ISO 200. Programed Auto.
Minimal processing in Lr beyond the crop. Vibrance, Clarity, Sharpen.
From Central Park.
Bonus shot:
A slightly different view, using the telephoto end of the zoom to crop in tighter.
Tighter on the Boats
4/4/2009
J S de Elcano in Galveston Harbor
To quote from a Lighthouse Depot description of a model of this ship: Four-Masted Schooner Model…An Impressive 44″ In Length The Juan Sebastian de Elcano is a training ship for the Royal Spanish Navy. At 370 feet long, it is the third largest Tall Ship in the world. Built in 1927 in Cadiz, it is named after a 16th century explorer and captain of Magellan’s global fleet. Steel hulled and steel masted, a marvel of gilt and teak, ropework and canvas, with a crew polished to within an inch of their lives, the J S de Elcano is an impressive sight to happen on in Galveston harbor, right next to the Off-Shore Oil Rig Museum.
This shot uses the full wide end of the zoom on the H50 and shows all the distortions of the lens, compounded by the upward tilt of the camera, which placed the ship across the axis of all most all of the distortions. Still. The distortions might even add to the impression of size and the majestic sweep of this elegant vessel.
The light was just about perfect for this detailed shot.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide (31mm equivalent). F5.6 @ 1/640 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
In Lightroom, some Recovery for the white highlights and the sky. Added Clarity and Vibrance in the Presence panel, and the Landscape sharpen preset.
From Galveston 2009.
Masthead Detail, J S de Elcano
3/29/2009
Monumental Shell
As I have mentioned before, one of the features I like best about the H9/H50 cameras from Sony is the tilt out articulated LCD. It allows getting right down on the ground for images without actually laying down. It allows upward angles from ground level (something that is difficult even if you do lay down). In this case, laying down was not really an option unless I was willing to get wet all over.
When you combine the articulated LCD with a very close macro ability, all kinds of new photographic options open up.
Just a shell on the beach, becomes a monument to shelldom.
Sony DSC H9 at full wide (32mm equivalent). F5.0 @ 1/200 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto. Macro mode.
In Lightroom, basic processing for Presence and sharpness. Recovery and some Fill Light was used to aid the transparency of the water. I used a graduated filter effect to further darken the sky, and added a bit of saturation to the filter as well. Levels were adjusted to bright up the lights +60 and subdue the darks -20. (It is maybe important to mention again that though it sounds like a lot of manipulation in Lightroom, I spent less than 3 minutes on this image in post…Lightroom is very fast.)
From Around Home.
3/20/2009
Barra from the Erriskay Causeway
Until fairly recently the only way to get from South Uist to Erriskay was by boat across the narrow strait. Now you can drive. The view in either direction is nothing short of spectacular. To the west and south you have the sound of Barra and the island beyond. To the east and north across the blue-green water (more green than blue) you have the apparently unnamed mountains at the south end of South Uist (I am certain they have names, but they are not on any map I could find). I have found since that the color of the water, here and elsewhere it is found, is the result of a white sand bottom reflecting sunlight back.
Sony DSC H50 full wide (31mm equivalent). F6.3 @ 1/1000 @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
In Lightroom, some Recovery for the sky, Vibrance and Clarity in the Presence panel, and Sharpen landscape preset. Recently I went back and added a graduated filter from the top, covering down just below the edge of the beach to lower the exposure of the sky…and added a touch of Fill Light to open the shadows.
From Scotland.
And the view in the other direction.
South Uist from the Erriskay Causeway
3/15/2009
Three (click image for different sizes)
Interesting light, interesting patterns in the water and an interesting arrangement of birds. The zoom on the H50 reaches out to frame it.
Taken at the mouth of the San Diego River (flood control channel), an excellent place to see a wide variety of water birds in San Diego.
Exposing for the water meant that the backs of the birds, in full sun, is slightly blown, but since it is the pattern that is of interest, I can live with that.
Sony DSC H50 at 400mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/640th @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
Recovery in Lightroom, which adds transparency to the water almost as a polarizer would, and some fill light to lighten the shadows on the birds. Normal Presence settings (added Clarity and Vibrance). Sharpen landscape preset.
From San Diego 2009.
3/3/2009
Hebrides Sunset Loch: click image for larger views at SmugMug
We arrived on North Uist in the Hebrides, via the ferry from Skye, in the long long sunset. That far north it seems the sun hangs on the horizon for about 3 hours. As we drove down the island toward our B&B, we were just about pulled off the road by scenes like this. Just a little unnamed loch, with a fishing pier.
The light of the sun from behind the low clouds was clearly the subject, and always a challenging one. I exposed a variety of shots, metering on the foreground, the sky, the horizon, etc. To change the metering, my quick and dirty approach is to center the area of interest and use the exposure lock (half press the shutter release), then to reframe for composition. By including more or less sky in the metered position you and dramatically bias exposure, and you can immediately see the approximate effect on the LCD. This version was exposed primarily for the sky and the foreground was brought up in post-processing: though I have others were the sky is even more dominant.
I also cropped out a significant section of dark sky to aid the composition.
[I should mention that this is a Hebrides sunset. The sun was 30 minutes to an hour above the horizon and the color is from the low clouds. In the Hebrides, the sun hands at and just below the horizon for what seems like hours. It did not get dark for at least 3 hours after this shot, so the challenge of bringing the foreground up to natural levels was particular to the scene. Even this does not show the foreground as bright as it was in reality.]
Sony DSC H50 at about 800mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
Besides the Fill Light and Curves necessary to bring up the foreground, I applied some Vibrance and Clarity in the Presence panel. Because the foreground and high clouds (away from the sun) was dark in the original, I had quite a bit of noise once the curves were set, so I used Lightroom’s noise reduction sliders to smooth out the color.
See more of Scotland in the Scotland gallery.
PS.
After some discussion on one of the digital photo groups, I decided to go back and do some dodge and burn on the image using Lightroom’s Adjustment Brush. I selectively darkened the sky half a stop, and brought up the midground hills about the same, while bringing up the foreground rocks almost a full stop. I also increased the contrast of the foreground rocks, and the saturation of the midground hills on the right. This was a quick and dirty experiment. I would work much more carefully for a keeper.
Lightroom dodge and burn
And here it is using Lightroom’s Graduated Filter effect.
Graduated Filter effect.
1/28/2009
Hooded Merganser
The Hooded Merganser is one of my most sought after subjects…in that I have, to date, not gotten a completely satisfying image of one. Part of the problem is that 1) I only reliably see them in Florida or New Mexico, 2) I am only in FL and NM a few times a year, always the same weeks, and the Hoodies may or may not be there then, 3) they are never close enough, 4) the brilliant white markings on the jet black body are almost impossible to expose for, and 5) even the yellow eye is so intense against the black that it often burns out.
I went to Viera Wetlands specifically for Hooded Merganser. I knew there would be a lot of bonus birds (though I did not expect the treasures I actually found), but it was the reported Hoodeds, and some images my friend Roy Halpen had taken there a year ago, that inspired me to spend the morning of my flight home there.
It took me three loops of the dike roads to find this guy. The distance was right. The light was a bit more intense than I would have liked by that time of day. And he never did flare his head crest all the way out, but this is my best Hooded Merganser shot so far. Softer light would have maybe allowed me to maintain some feather detail in the crest, but then I would have lost the drama of the reeds and their reflections, and the highlighted ripples. All in all, pretty good okay. I still hope for a better shot someday…but I am pretty happy with this.
Sony DSC N1 behind the eyepiece of a Zeiss Diascope 85FL. Equiv. combined focal length approximately 3000mm. F5.0 @ 1/250th @ ISO 64. -.7 EV exposure compensation. Selective spot focus placed on eye.
From the Space Coast Birding Gallery.
1/22/2009
Alone
The odd pose of the bird as it hunts…the odd lighting in the shadowed channel and the late sun, the reflections beyond the bird, and patterning in the water in the foreground, all combine for me into something more than the sum of their parts. Not a picture of a bird, though the bird is important to the picture, but a picture of a moment in time, a quirky moment, when the lone hunter is most alone. The distance keeps us distant, but so do the harmonies of the composition…the pattern of light and dark, color and the silver of the water. Not your typical bird portrait.
Sony DSC H50 at almost full telephoto (400mm equiv.). F4.5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 100. Programed Auto.
In Lightroom, I used some Recovery to bring up detail in the foreground water, Clarity and Vibrance for overall effect, and the Sharpen landscapes preset. Once more, the image required some Fill Light to open shadows.
From the Space Coast Birding Gallery.