Contrasts

Contrasts

During the Cub Scout Camporee, I was able to take some photographs of the Autumn colors that I liked. This image was captured when all of us parents were relaxing outside of our tents. I happened to look up and noticed the moon clearly visible between two trees. The tree on the right is an evergreen. The tree on the left had turned yellow for the season. I didn't even have to leave my camp chair to get it. I just had to look around to notice something that I had not expected to see.

I call the image contrasts for a couple of reasons. First, it shows the contrasts between evergreen and deciduous trees in Autumn. Second, it shows the Moon out during the middle of the day which contrasts against when we would expect to observed it this clearly. Together the trees and the moon illustrate the contrasts that we do not notice most of the time that are around us throughout the year.

I suppose that might sound a bit artsy, but I actually was thinking along those lines while photographing this scene. There were nearly a dozen frames taken of it with different compositions. This is the one that best captured what I was thinking at the time.

Moral of this story is look around and you could find something unexpected that makes a good image. Try not to look around with blinders. There might be a great image just above you, at your feet, or right behind you.

Keep shooting.

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Have some fun

Dancin' in the park

Here is a picture of my son dancing to the pre-show music at the Movie in the Park the other day. He was having fun. These days we seem to always try to get the sharpest photographs possible. Sometimes, though, blurry pictures are better particularly when they convey movement or an emotion. Remember to try using slow shutter speeds at times. The blurs might be better than freezing something in mid-stride. Have fun ... blur a little!

Keep shooting.


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Shooting the sky again

Sky over Spartanburg

We had such a nice sky while out at Barnett Park on Saturday, that I took lots of photographs of it. Like textures, they can be used as layers in Photoshop to provide a textured appearance to an image. They can also be used to replace "bad skies" in otherwise good images. Or, they can just be nice too look at by themselves. The trick to shooting the sky is to pay attention to your highlight warning / histogram to make sure that you are not over exposure large areas or areas of important detail. Under exposure, negative exposure compensation, etc. are generally necessary here. Slight to moderate under exposure tends to saturate the colors in the sky quite nicely. Again, pay attention to your histogram to make certain that you do not completely under expose the sky and loose import details.

Keep shooting.

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Rainbow Arc

Rainbow Arc

We went to a see a movie at Barnett Park in Spartanburg. This is the second year that the Hub City Church has hosted Movies at the Park there. It is a monthly event during the Spring and Summer to raise money for some charities. We stopped by KFC to pick up dinner, ate on the grass in the park, and enjoyed the evening. The weather forecast was for rain and while we had a couple of drizzles early on, the rain held off until after the movie and everyone was getting back in their cars. The movie this month was Kung-Fu Panda. All of the kids seemed to enjoy it. I enjoyed it as I had not seen it yet.

A small branch of a rainbow appeared briefly after the drizzle had abated. Very few people seemed to notice it though. I took several shots of it with and without the polarizing filter. A polarizing filter can help accentuate a rainbow as the light from it is naturally polarized. Plus, a little color boosting during development helps out too.

Keep shooting.

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Shoot some textures

Verde Antique

Sometimes the textures of an object appeals to me. This decorative stonework is on the facade of a downtown building. I shot hoping to emphasize the veining throughout the stone and to bring out some of the green as well. Something like this could be used as a background texture for a weathered or antiqued look. Thinking about that just now gave me an idea. I'll have to fire up Photoshop later today.

Keep shooting.

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Some times the camera is right

Community

We had a fun time at the Spartanburg Regional Classic Pro Bicycle Races Friday evening. We got to see the women's category 3&4/Junior's race and most of the men's category 3&4 race. It was a pleasant evening with a nice breeze/wind. The announcer said that it was about 15 mph at times. It was blowing right down the main straight aways for the course. Thus, the riders had either a 15 mph tail wind or a 15 mph head wind. The part of the course with a hill had the head wind of course. Still, some of the men we saw race were hitting up to 35 mph. The course was a 1 km circuit through downtown around the Denny's corporate building. The men's race we saw was a 30 km race. The women's was a 25 km race. It was fun to see it in that kind of setting though. However, there were not very many spectators.

More after the jump.

Overall, I'm happy with some of the images I got from this outing. The shot above though kind of had a story to it. You see, I was actually trying to line up a shot of the racers passing by the review stand for the next lap. However, the camera decided to focus on this police officer and child that were just a bit in front of me. It was as if the camera was saying, "No you dumby! THIS is the shot you really want!". Luckily, I recognized the moment for what it was and shot off a couple of quick frames. It didn't last very long and was underexposed. However, the camera was right. It was the shot I wanted. It seems to capture the spirit of the event. That being the community coming to town to enjoy an event together. The child is watching the racers approach and the police officer seems to be watching over him. I know it looks like she's holding the boy, but the mother was actually holding him just out of the frame and behind the officer. Fortunately, it wasn't so badly under exposed that I couldn't recover it. That is one of the reasons I shoot in RAW (NEF) format. You have more latitude and information in the file. It was under exposed because I had the exposure set for the distant riders who were in the bright afternoon sunlight. The moment with the child and officer, who were in shade, was so quick that I didn't have time to adjust the shutter speed to get a proper exposure on them.

Still, I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. Pay attention to your viewfinder. Sometimes what you see might not be want you want to see in it, but sometimes it might be even better than what you want. Keep your eyes and mind open for those fleeting moments you can't plan.

More shots of the race to come.

Keep shooting.
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And the winner is ...

The Runner

Another close-up of the trophies from the Shamrock Fun Run at Furman University last week. This one was taken from the same position as the image I posted on Wednesday. However, this one is vertically oriented as opposed to the horizontal orientation of the previous image. Notice how today's image seems to focus more on an individual, while the other is more about a group. Simply turning the camera 90 degrees changes the implied subject and mood you can capture.

The next time you are out with your camera. Try photographing with both horizontal and vertical orientations of the same subject.

Keep shooting.

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Running with the pack

On your marks!

This is a close-up of the trophies from the Shamrock Fun Run. As you can see, there were quite a few due to the various age groups. I was particularly attracted to the fading lines and reflections made by the trophies. I also "worked" them from several angles and compositions. This is my favorite of all of them.

It always helps to change your shooting angles, height, distance, compositions, etc. whenever you are able to do so. Take photographs from odd places. Get the camera out of your natural height and you will notice that they start to improve. Get above, below, to the side, up close, far away, etc. from your natural inclination to lock your knees and shoot with the camera in the same place all of the time. You will start to see more interesting things, your compositions will start to look different than those of everyone else with you at the time, and you will begin to see how the quality of light changes with even small changes in angle or position.

Keep shooting.

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Snow and a Camera Tip

Snowcapped

I've been practicing with lighting, but don't have anything to really show off from it yet. Instead, how about another snow image? It is hard to believe that a tad more than a week ago, the trees in my yard looked like the shot above. A couple of days later and the snow was all gone. Now it has been sunny and in the 70s-80s the past few days. I noticed that some of the neighborhood dogwoods are beginning to bud. So, it looks like you folks will get inundated with flower pictures soon enough. I bet you'll want to see more snow pictures before the flowers drop off. ;-)

Yesterday, I stumbled on a neat "feature" of my Nikon D80. I was reviewing the sharpness of an image on the LCD display when I accidentally turned the command dial on the back of the camera. To my surprise it advanced the image. The really cool thing about it though is that it advanced to the next image at the same zoom level in the same position as the previous image! Do you realize how easy this makes it to compare images for sharpness on the LCD? Before I would look at one image, zoom in several times, check the sharpness, zoom out until I got back to the full image, go to the next image I wanted to check, zoom in several times, and check that image, etc. Sometimes it took a lot of time and button presses. Now, I only have to zoom in on the first image and then move to the next image with the Command dial. This will be great for those times that I am shooting a series in continuous mode. I will have a better idea which one is sharpest and in less time with fewer buttons to press. I guess it is the little things that sometimes excite us.

Keep shooting.

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Siren

Siren

This photograph was taken at a local event last year where one of the local fire departments brought their engine truck. I liked the chrome reflections and orange color. Details of larger objects can be interesting in themselves and yet still give an overall impression of the object as a whole.

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Gargoyles

Gargoyles

This photograph was taken last year when we visited the Biltmore House in Asheville, North Carolina. It is also one of my most viewed images according to the statistics on Zenfolio. Biltmore House was built in an old, European style and as such has lots of statuary details integrated into it's exterior. While we were outside the front of the house, I was looking around for interesting, and well lit details to photograph. These gargoyles caught my attention. Framed against the blue sky and clouds, they seem to almost be leaping off the building at the visitors below.

My point ... Look up! Look all around you. Good photographic subjects won't just be on the ground or at eye level. Choose your backgrounds carefully, fill the frame and make your subjects pop out of the image. I don't think this photograph would be quite as good without the clouds. Nor would it be quite as striking without the blue sky as well.

Open your eyes to the world around you. Photogenic subjects are everywhere.

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A Dash of Yellow

A Dash of Yellow

Flowers are always a popular photographic subject. For this shot, instead of wanting one flower in sharp focus, I wanted a field of purple with a couple of points of yellow. So, I used a shallow depth of field and zoomed all the way out with my lens. I also had to get down low and close the flowers to further exagerate the depth of field.

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Shoot the sky!

Red Sky

This is a photograph of a sunset sky. No ground or horizon. Just the sky. I really like the colors and constrasts here. Like textures, skies can provide interesting, abstract subjects on their own. A stormy sky might project a sense of forboding. Large, white, puffy clouds and a blue skyu could denote a more pastral emotion. Take photographs of just the skies you see. You might capture some interesting clouds, or possibly have some textures you could use on future images. A good sky picture might be used to replace an uninteresting sky in an otherwise nice landscape image.

Plus, the sky is always there and won't complain about having it's picture taken.

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Textures

Paint Texture

We went to my in-laws to drop my son off for a sleep-over. While we were there I took some photographs of the house and property. Nothing particularly impressive photographically, but there were a couple of interesting textures I took to add to my collection. I might use these as filters for processing images or something similar. The others after the jump.


Paint Texture 2

Granite Texture 1

Granite Texture 2

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Toward Heaven

To start things off, here is a photograph I took this past weekend at the annual Greek Festival in Greenville, South Carolina. This is the dome of the St. George Greek Orthodox Church that hosts the festival every year. It is one of their major fundraisers.



Photon Talk: This isn't the greatest photograph of a church ever, but I liked it. It was also one of those "happy accidents" that sometimes happens. The accident was in when I adjusted my circular polarizing filter. I framed the dome for a symmetrical composition and exposed off of the white cupola. I then adjusted my circular polarizer until the sky when dark and snapped the picture. I did this as we were walking across the street and herding my seven-year old son. What I didn't realize at the time was that I had locked the exposure before adjusting the polarizing filter. You usually adjust the filter first so that your exposure doesn't get borked (That is one of the many technical terms I love to use, btw.) Well, when I opened the picture I was surprised that the sky was black. Not dark blue like I thought I'd gotten, but black like night. The neat thing about it though, at least as far as I was concerned, was that the cupola and crusifix seemed to glow against the constrasting dark sky.

Pixel Talk: What I did to process this was to use Nikon Capture NX to place a few color control points to reduce the glare on the dome, and to brighten the sky a bit so there was more of a deep, royal blue tone to it. An unsharp mask for a touch of sharpening finished it off.

Photon Tip: So, the take away from this for me? Experiment with your filters and exposure sequence. You might bork the shot, or you migh get something unexpectedly neat.
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