Monthly Archives: October 2010
10/11/2010: color on the Mousam
Happy Columbus Day! In New England, Columbus day weekend is celebrated primarily by motel and restaurant owners, as the height of the short, but profitable, leaf peeping season. I am, of course, still in Georgia, though I am headed home today.
This is a week ago, right across the road from Old Falls Pond of yesterday’s post. This is the Mousam River above Old Falls, framed at the medium-tel end of the zoom on the Canon to catch a pocket of color and the reflections in the surface of the moving water. Sometimes less is more…or at least as much.
Here is the full scene.
Both shots are three exposure HDRs using autobracket shifted –2/3 EV on the Canon SX20IS. Exposures were blended and tone-mapped in Photomatix, and processed in Lightroom for using Fill Light, Blackpoint, Clarity and touch of Vibrance, and, of course, Sharpen narrow edges. One advantage of the HDR method, if you like the effect, is the automatic blurring of moving water, even at higher shutter speeds. The three different exposures catch the water, as in the falls here, in three slightly different positions and Photomatix, though it does a really good job of blending exposures, does produce some blur for the overlapping motion. A rapidly moving surf line, for instance, or foreground vegetation moving in a strong wind, is death to HDR. Here it actually, I think, adds to effectiveness of the image.
So I am looking forward to seeing what the foliage is like in Maine the day after Columbus Day…
10/10/2010: old falls pond fall Hdr
Happy Sunday!
Old Falls Pond in West Kennebunk Maine is one of my favorite autumn color spots. It is across the road from Old Falls itself, which is my other most favorite autumn color spot. My most visited, most awarded, highest rated photo on flickr is a shot of this pond from several autumns ago. That was before I started working with HDR, and, though the leaves were not yet at peak, I took a run out last Sunday to see how it looked. (I am writing this from Jekyll Island GA, where I have spent every Columbus Day weekend for the past 8 years (work), so I never do see the traditional peak foliage in Maine.) Still, Old Falls Pond was looking pretty good, and with a sky that just begged for HDR treatment.
The low angle (camera almost touching the water), the floating leaves, the way the light runs on the ripples on the water, the glimpse of the bottom through the foreground, the foliage itself, and the sky overall with its strong diagonal slant…this image has enough going on to overcome the otherwise rather static composition. I did experiment with cropping out part of the sky to “improve” composition, but I like the full shot better.
Three shots with the Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent, auto bracketed, with the –2/3s EV exposure compensation. Exposure was blended and tonemapped in Photomatix, and the resulting image was processed in Lightroom using Fill Light, Blackpoint, Clarity and Vibrance, and the Sharpen narrow edges preset. Finally I applied a Graduated Filter Effect to the lower third of the image, reducing brightness slightly, which had the effect of making the water more transparent, for that hint of bottom.
Which goes to show you, I think, that if you are at your peak, in tune with the creative spirit inside, the foliage does not have to be!
10/8/2010: Fox pond under cloud
This scene, if taken today, would probably be even more awesome, as the fall color would be about peak, but we work with what we have! On the way back from Machias and daughter number 3’s first college homecoming weekend (she is a freshman) we stopped at Fox Pond on the short cut my GPS found on the trip back from dropping my daughter off at college in August. You may remember.
This is a three exposure, auto bracketed, HDR from the Canon SX20IS using Photomax. Final processing in Lightroom, for my standard Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen.
I like the HDR effect here, which gives the sky and cloud reflection a dominant play, but keeps the foliage vibrant. The low angle (ground level) and the transparency of the water in the foreground and the tiny pebbles lock the frame down and keep it from receding into the clouds.
10/8/2010: reflections on snowy egret
People kept telling me about this pond on the gulf course on Jekyll Island where the birds, egrets, herons, and Wood Storks, were roosting for the night, and, after a couple of aborted attempts, I actually found it just before sunset yesterday. Quite a show! Roosting birds and birds flying in for the night…constantly something going on. These Snowy Egrets were there when I got there, part of a group of 15 birds, including immature White Ibis and an Anhinga, on a snag in the water out maybe 70 feet and at the foot of the bank where I was standing, maybe 20 feet above them, still in bright light but just below where the setting sun was striking the trees across the pond. Ideal! I spent 20 minutes with the group.
I was shooting the pair in the second image when my scope drifted down and caught the reflections. I could not resist.
Both shots with the Canon Powershot SD4000IS Digital Elph behind the new Vario eyepiece of the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL spotting scope for an equivalent field of view in the 3500mm range. Programmed auto. –1.6 EV exposure compensation.
Processed in Lightroom for Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen.
Lots more digiscoped birds in my Jekyll Island 2010 gallery.
10/7/2010: Great meadow / fall fire
In lean times I would definitely make four posts out of this series. The fact is that my trip to Machias and Bar Harbor, though the weather was not what you think of as photogenic, was very productive. I have a lot of images I want to share.
This is Great Meadow in Acadia National Park (more a marsh than a meadow) as the first of the fall colors are just beginning to show. Young maples and birches, in low wet ground, always take fire first.
Canon SX20IS at various zoom settings for framing. The last image is a three exposure HDR using Photomatix. All processed in Lightroom with Fill Light, Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance and Sharpen.
10/6/2010: Jekyll island sunset
I still have lots of pics to share from my trip to Machias and Acadia National Park, and you will see some of them, but I can’t resist moving to Georgia today, since I am physically here on Jekyll Island this morning. Jekyll Island is a strange, beautiful place. You can read all about it on the Jekyll Island wiki page, or get the official version at jekyllisland.com.
I went out last evening particularly to catch the sunset, but only got to the east side of the island before the lure of the reflected light on the clouds and the downed trees I knew littered the beach drew me to the side of the road and down a trail. I was not disappointed.
This is an HDR using 3 autobracketed shots from the Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent, with the center of the range moved down 2/3s EV using exposure compensation. Normally I avoid HDR where there are waves along a shoreline (or any other moving subject), but with this particular kind of surf, a 3 shot HDR is possible, since the inevitable blurring of the moving water produces a interesting and attractive rendering. The exposures were blended in Photomatix, and then the result was processed with Recovery, Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance and Sharpening in Lightroom. Color balance was also adjusted using the auto tool.
And here are two more shots from the same location, taken a few moments earlier. These are also HDRs, processed as above. the first is cropped for a more panoramic look.
10/5/2010: Quoddy Head Light
These are my last shots from Quoddy Head. The light as seen from the south in the heavy fog. I took a bunch of shots trying to catch the lamp lit and toward me, but the real trick was matching the color balance of this shot and the one at the foot of the blog. The fog, when zoomed in like this, really messed with the color, and cast everything blue. It took a lot of trial and error in Lightroom, working with Color Temperature and Hue to get the two images somewhere near balance…and then, for this one I needed dualing Graduated Filter effects…from the top to darken, from the bottom to brighten and increase contrast…in order to reproduce something like the natural look of the scene.
Canon SX20IS at about 100mm equivalent. F4.5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 80. Landscape Program.
Besides the dualing GF effects and color adjustments above, some Recovery, Fill Light, Blackpoint well right, added Clarity and Vibrance, and Sharpen narrow edges preset.
The second image is taken from the same spot, but at 28mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/400th @ ISO 80. Also Landscape Program.
Similar treatment in Lightroom, without the GF effects and color balancing. This one requires a larger view.
I am publishing this early since I have to be on a flight to Georgia at 6AM tomorrow morning.
10/4/2010: Green point, quoddy head panorama
This needs to be viewed as large as your monitor will allow. Click the image and use the size controls at the top of the window that opens.
The fog never did lift during my visit to Quoddy Head State Park. I hiked as far down the coast as Green Point. This is a panorama of 4 28mm equivalent shots, looking south, assembled with PhotoShop Elements Panorama tool, and processed in Lightroom (Fill Light, Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen).
This is the standard Canon SX20IS wide angle view north from the other side of Green Point. This has to be the epitome of Maine’s rock-bound, fog-bound coast!
10/3/2010: Peat Bog details
Happy Sunday!
As I said yesterday, the peat bog at Quoddy Head State Park is a vibrant habitat. I don’t know how it looks in spring or summer, but in fall, the dense mix of mosses and lichens, in shades of red and green (and even white) form a rich carpet, dotted with an amazing abundance of pitcher plants, most of which in this season are deep red or even purple. The closer you look the more inspiring it becomes. The contrasts of color and texture and form, and the variety packed into every square foot, are, to my eye, wonderfully beautiful.
It makes me want, as few habitats to, to study…to find out what all these plants are and how they are related. The carpet of the bog is so alive…I want to know how it works. There has to be a fascinating story in anything so intricate and so beautiful.
And, of course (being Sunday), while there is certainly a science that makes up the story, for me it will always be the story of a Creator from whom I inherit the eye and the heart that can appreciate such intricate beauty: that can stand in awe and respond in worship.
This is the kind of environment and the kind of work that brings out the best in the Canon SX20IS. This set of shots runs from one end of the macro zoom range to the other; several would have been very difficult, shooting from the narrow boardwalk, without the lip out LCD viewer; and the detail shots, in the dim light of foggy day, are all at an impressive ISO 200. And I can fully appreciate the beauty in Canon’s accomplishment as well.
Of course, I do plan a trip back to Quoddy Head in the spring to see what the peat bog looks like then!
10/2/2010: Peat bog!
Saco Heath is one of my favorite photographic destinations in Southern Maine. I have used several images from there as Pic of the Days and I have a gallery on Wide Eyed In Wonder dedicated to it. Saco Heath is a remnant peat bog…the southern-most in Maine, and, as such, provides a sample of an environment that I would otherwise not have access to.
While at Quoddy Head State Park last Saturday, I visited their peat bog…tiny compared to Saco Heath, but totally, awesomely alive. It is obvious, having seen the bog at Quoddy Head, how the bog at Saco Heath struggles for survival. Even in the fog, and even as fall comes on, the Quoddy bog is vibrant and beautiful. At a guess I would say there are more pitcher plants in a 3 yard square of Quoddy than there are in all of Saco. And the variety of mosses and lichens and stunted trees is simply amazing. Truly a beautiful little gem of a bog!
For today I preset the bog in the wide view. Tomorrow you will see some of the detail. The top shot shows a section where the moss still rules, and the second shot, from the back edge of the bog, shows how the trees have pushed out into the bog, where they live a life in miniature. The fog, in both cases, and imho, only adds to the atmosphere of the place.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. Both at f4.0 @ 1/100th @ ISO 80 and Landscape program.
Recovery in Lightroom for the overexposed fog, some Fill Light and Blackpoint right, added Clarity and Vibrance, and Sharpen narrow edges preset. Since the fog in the distance was completely white and somewhat distracting, I used a Graduated Filter effect on both images to darken the sky, which had the added benefit of making the fog more transparent.