Monthly Archives: August 2009
8/21/2009
Kirkby Longsdale
A small village between the Lakes and the Dales, just outside Yorkshire Dales National Park. Home of Ruskin. Lots of famous views and a bridge. We spent a afternoon there with rain threatening the whole time, but glorious light most of the time. This is a view out over the Longsdale River valley.
Minolta A1 at 28mm equivalent. F7.1 @ 1/400th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Required heavy Recovery in Lightroom for the sky, a touch of Fill Light, and blackpoint adjustment. Punch and Landscape sharpen presets.
8/20/2009
Walls along the Lane, Above Kendal
From the same walk as the shot from yesterday, just a few yards up the lane. Amazing stone walls in this part of England. The rolling hills, the sheep, the colors, and the sky.
Minolta A1, at 28mm equivalent. F7.1 @ 1/400th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Required a graduated filter effect from the top to bring out detail in the sky, and a blackpoint adjustment to intensify the colors, as well as the bulk processing listed yesterday.
8/19/2009
Hills above Kendal, between the Lakes and the Dales
In honor of being in England (where I will not have access to this blog), I will post some images from a trip my wife and took to the Lake Country and Yorkshire Dales in 2005. They were taken with the Minolta A1, perhaps the worst digital camera I have ever used…it had a great lens: 28 to 140mm equivalent as I remember, but the sensor had very limited dynamic range compared to cameras I have owned since. I eventually bought a little 6mp Sony pocket camera and, when I saw the results it produce, stopped carrying the A1 altogether. Eventually there was a recall on the model when the sensors failed. By then my daughter was using the camera, and the sensor failed right after the Sony Minolta deal when service was in limbo. I never did get it fixed.
This is image, on the other hand, is one of my favorites from the camera and the trip. Our first night at a farm house B&B above Kendal at the edge of the Lake District, between the lakes and the dales, we took a walk in the B&B.
Minolta A1, at 70mm equivalent. F7.1 @ 1/400th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
In Lightroom I preprocessed all the images in this set (>200) as a batch, applying the Punch preset (added Clarity and Vibrance), and the Landscape sharpen preset. I then opened individual images for additional processing. On this one I applied some Recovery for the sky, a bit of Fill Light, and slid the blackpoint to the right to intensify all the colors.
From England 2005.
8/18/2009
Pumpkin Flower
I leave for England and the British Birding Fair, where I will be assisting Zeiss UK with the Digiscoping Stand, attending meetings, etc. I am posting a few ahead here so you might not notice my absence.
This is from a growing set of images from around my yard in Kennebunk. Our yard is nothing special. We are casual landscapers and gardeners at best. But we do have pumpkin plants. They are unlikely to make pumpkins here inside the tide line where the season is short even by southern Maine standards, but they are great plants…with great flowers.
This was taken with the super macro on my little Sanyo dual HD camcorder and 10mp still camera. It does a not half bad job. As you might guess, the camera was right down inside the large flower to take this shot.
Sanyo VPC GG 10 at it’s 40mm equivalent widest setting and macro. F3.5 @ 1/280th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just my basic added Clarity, Vibrance, and sharpen in Lighroom.
8/17/2009
Mature Indian Pipe Flower
I have seen Indian Pipe at this stage of development, and photographed it here at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge…it was pinker last year…but somehow I never looked inside the blossom. Indian Pipe begins well drooped over on its stalk and only goes erect as the blossom matures. Inside, as you can see, are all the flower parts. I think these are actually beginning to form seeds.
Indian Pipe is often thought of as fungus…deriving nutrients from decomposing plant matter…but it is actually a fungal symbiont, taking its nutrients from the fungus it is associated with. Generally symbiont provide sugars from photosynthesis in exchange for the minerals they get from the fungus, but the Indian Pipe actually robs the fungus of sugars it got from another symbiont in exchange for minerals. More parasite that symbiont, when you come right down to it.
This shot was taken right down to it too…using the flip out LCD on the H50 at ground level.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F3.2 @ 1/40th @ ISO 200. Programed auto.
In Lightroom, cropped a bit for a tighter view. Mild Recovery for the white of the flower. Blackpoint to the right. Added Clarity and Vibrance, and Landscape sharpen.
This is a view of a pair of fully mature flowers from straight above.
Indian Pipe from Straight Up
8/16/2009
Bubbles in the Stream
Happy Sunday.
Another shot from the depths of Emmon’s Preserve. Lest you get the wrong idea, the total extent of Emmon’s Preserve is maybe 25 acres. It is tiny. Sandwiched in between rural housing areas. In spots, when the leaves are thin, you can see the backyards and hay fields that surround it from the deepest parts.
Still beautiful. And the stream is never the same twice.
Sony DSC H50 at about 85mm equivalent. F3.2 @ 1/100th @ ISO 400. Programed auto.
Just the basic added Clarity and Vibrance, and Landscape sharpen in Lightroom. Cropped slightly at the top to eliminate a bright, distracting highlight.
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.]
8/14/2009
A Matter of Perspective: Yellow
The house is actually across the river behind the beach which this high dune separates from the inflow of a smaller creek. The yellow flowers just cried out to be the subject though, and the angle makes it an interesting shot (imho).
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F5.6@ 1/500th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just my basic added Clarity and Vibrance and Landscape sharpen, with some added Contrast as well. I used a Graduated Filter effect from the top to darken the sky, and the vignetting tool to lighten the corners of the image.
8/13/2009
Rock My River Horizon
I took several shots along this sharply sloping tidal river bank, attracted by the rocks in the late low sun, the sand shapes, and the blue of sky and water. This one works best for me. Very low angle using the flip out LCD on the H50 and getting right down at beach level, actually a bit below the curve of the beach. I feel some tension, in a good way, in the shot: somehow generated by the balance between the drama of the rocks and the placid river and sky. For me it as a lot of energy.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F4.5 @ 1/250th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
In Lightroom all my standard adjustments for the H50: added Clarity and Vibrance, Landscape sharpen, blackpoint to the right. I also used a graduated filter effect from the top slanted slightly from the left, to darken the sky. And I opened the shadows slightly with the Fill Light tool.
8/12/2009
Logged on to the Horizon
Late light. Sand. Driftwood. Beach grass. Bit of clouds over the horizon.
Sony DSC H50 at about 40mm equivalent. F5.6 @ 1/400 @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Recovery and cropping in Lightroom. Added Clarity and Vibrance, and Landscape sharpen preset.