Posts from the ‘One Click’ Category
In today’s world of digital photography, it is easy to get caught up in the power of post processing, however, sometimes it’s just as fun to take your camera on a walk through the city.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D700
Nikkor 45mm PC-E
Hand held
Exposure 0.004 sec (1/250)
Aperture f/2.8
Focal Length 45 mm
ISO Speed 800
Processing Notes:
Set the 700’s picture control to Vivid
Post the .jpg
….no kidding, that simple!
A while back I was searching for a reasonable backup camera to travel with over the summer. After quite a bit of deliberation, I decided on the Nikon D5000. I have been putting it through the paces and I am quite pleased. Here is a simple capture from the camera while we were out on a drive over the weekend. I will be writing up a more formalish review of it shortly, as for now, here are a couple things I like about it.
- Same image guts as its big (D90) and bigger (D300s) brother.
- Quiet shutter mode. It helped when shooting some street photos in France. Very stealthy.
- It has video! I made a quick movie while I was in France that I am still editing. Once it is done I will post it along with a more detailed review.
- Super light and compact.
- You can get the same image quality of a D300s, for under $500 (if you are willing to buy refurbished).
- Swivel LCD – Much easier on the back when having to shoot in yoga poses.
We made our way from the Toulouse airport to our final destination in La Mongie, the clouds thickened as we gained elevation driving up the slopes of the Tourmalet. We were filled with anticipation knowing the summit of one of the most famous mountains in the Pyrenees was only a couple kilometers ahead. That anticipation would continue to grow throughout the night since the fog bank refused to provide us the greeting we were hoping for! Do you know how hard it is to find your hotel when you don’t speak French and the visibility is limited to 15ft?
Another addition to my on going Spaceship Suburbia project. I thought I would try and capture a “Cloud City Scape” by shooting a busy scene full of the non-traditional. This was a sunrise shoot on the outskirts of Denver. When I pulled the camera to my eye, I was sucked into the depth and variety of the shapes and shadows. I thought it would make a good addition to the project.
Answering The Call! A big Thank You is in order to all those that took the time to help me with my dilemma. I am truly thankful for the amount of time those that answered my Canon/Nikon SOS put into their responses. I am also humbled by the quality of photographers that visit LightAsMagic.com. I made my way to all your websites and photostreams, and I am inspired by your work. It is obvious by your responses that Canon is indeed a great company. But there is also something said about familiarity. There is a lot to digest, and I will take some time tomorrow to revisit all the comments and post a reply to everyone. Thanks again! Heck, even my wife and mother-in-law chimed in. If you go back and read the comments I am sure you will find the wonderful humorous perspective my wife added to the discussion. Let it be know my mother-in-law voted in favor of Nikon. Her vote counts double. I will keep you posted on my final decision and the reasoning behind it.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 80-200 AFD
Gitzo Traveler
Processing Notes:
Capture 1 Image
Adobe camera raw
Photoshop Contrast/Sat boost
Sized for web
LightAsMagic.com
Tip: When I am trying to create a silhouette in an image, I will switch my camera’s meter to spot meter mode and meter an area that is pretty bright, but not the source of the light. In this scene this happened to be the area of the sky close to the horizon. After I have meter that area I will the lock the exposure, or make a note of it and reset it when I recompose. At that point, I will be shoot a couple of frames and review the images. You can rides you exposure compensation to quickly choke or expand the shadow areas.
At the beginning of the day, my buddy Fred was excited to pull over and explore the local fertilizer plants with me. 15 hours later, “Hey, there’s a fertilizer plant, let’s go photograph it.” became an inside joke.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 50mm 1.4 AFS (a new lens in my kit…and boy do I like it!)
Exposure: 0.002 sec (1/500)
Aperture: f/16.0
Focal Length: 50 mm
Exposure Bias: -2/3 EV
ISO Speed: 200
Processing Notes:
Capture (1 image)
Adobe Camera Raw – Raw processing
Photoshop – Curves adjustment (easy to set the white and black points)
Sized for web
Nik Sharpener – Display 40% Adaptive
LightAsMagic.com
Tip: I call it ‘Working The Composition’. When you find something that catches your eye, don’t walk away from the first composition you make. Approach it from different angles, focal lengths, and perspectives. Eventually your subconscious will team up with your conscious self and reward you with an image to be proud of.
After my run this weekend, I decided to swing by a couple locations I have had on the radar for a while. Surprisingly, this facility is fairly accessible at 7am on a Sunday. I approached it from a variety of angles, however because the sky was as clear as it has been in quite some time, I didn’t have the backdrop of interest I was looking for. I did find a couple of interesting foreground elements to incorporate, but nothing was really working. I thought to myself, what can I do with huge white silos and a blue sky? My decision was simple….Orange Filter! I applied an orange filter in my Silver Efex pro conversion, darkened the sky up, and created the contrast I was looking for to surround these structures.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Tokina 11-16 ATX Pro
Gitzo Traveler
Exposure: 1/4000 sec
Aperture: f/8.0
Focal Length: 14 mm
Exposure Bias: -2 EV
ISO Speed: 200
Processing Notes:
Capture (1 images)
Nik Siler Efex Pro – High contrast orange filter
NIk Viveza 2 – Selective boost to structure/brightness in foreground
Sized for web
Nik Sharpener 2.0 – Adaptive 40%
LightAsMagic.com
A stand of trees I have worked with before, caught my attention again. I probably tried 20-30 images as I was experimenting with various panning timings and techniques. I settled on this image because I enjoyed how a touch of detail was retained in the background. In order to capture the detail and still achieve the motion, I would turn the shutter over, pan quickly, then pause.
Click..Pan..Pause…Review….Click….Pan…..Pause…..Review…..until I got it right.
Capture Notes
NIkon D300
Nikkor 70-300 AFS VR II (VR ON)
Exposure: 0.5
Aperture: f/32.0
Focal Length: 100 mm
ISO Speed: 400
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
Flash: No Flash
Processing Notes:
Capture 1 image
Aperture – Raw processing (including definition and contrast boost)
Sized for web
LightAsMagic.com
I was racing the clouds home, just hoping there would be enough light left to grab my camera. Once home, I grabbed my gear and headed up to a nearby bluff to make some images. In my haste, I had forgotten to take a pair of gloves. After shooting about 20 images, the scene was just starting to peak. I switched my camera in to manual focus and tried to flip the switch to spot meter. At that point, I was rudely awakened from my creative haze by the realization that I could no longer feel my hands. The cold air and howling wind had completely shut down my dexterity. I didn’t let that stop me, I kept on shooting for another 10mins or so. It wasn’t until I was back in my truck driving home that I slowly began to regain feeling….and boy I felt it. It was like two hammers were crushing my thumbs. After about 2 blocks of screaming in pain, everything was back to normal and I was excited to download the new images.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 70-300 AFS VR II
Exposure: 0.008 sec (1/125)
Aperture: f/4.5
Focal Length: 90 mm
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
ISO Speed: 200
Processing Notes:
Capture (1 image)
Nik Color Efex Pro (Procontrast)
Nik Viveza 2 (Structure boost to the puffy white clouds)
Sized for web
LightAsMagic.com
If I were to ever record an album, I think I would use this image as the cover art. In college, when my band recorded a demo, the cover art was nothing more than contact information. Obviously my rock n’ roll fantasy didn’t work out. It sounds cliche, however my band fell victim to ‘creative differences’. I think we would have been a great band. I doubt we would have headlined a stadium rock show…..without question we would have opened for someone headlining a stadium rock show. Anyways, I added a page to the site where you can check out monthly playlists I have created to spread the word about bands I would have loved to open for. Click here to take a listen.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 16-85 VR II
Exposure: 1/4000 sec
Aperture: f/5.6
Focal Length: 85 mm
Processing Notes:
Capture
NIK Silver EFX Pro
NIK Color EFX Pro (Color Stylizer)
Photoshop (Resize for web)
LightAsMagic.com
We had front row seats on the roof of our hotel in Cozumel for this one! Most of the time I leave sunsets in color, in all their glory. However, because of the smaller clouds dancing in the foreground I decided the contrasts would make a nice black and white composition.
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 70-300 VR AFS
Singh-Ray 3stop Reverse GND
Gitzo Traveler
Exposure: 0.033 sec (1/30)
Aperture: f/11.0
Focal Length: 300 mm
Processing Notes:
Capture (1 image)
NIK Silver EFX Pro (B+W Conversion)
NIK Viveza 2 (enhance the glow of the sun on the sea)
Photoshop (resized for web)
LightAsMagic.com
Tip: It might seem counter intuitive to shoot sunsets with a long focal length, but it is a great way to get up and close and personal with a setting sun. I always carry a 70-300 with me while traveling.
By no means do I consider myself a wildlife photographer, I don’t have the patience for it. If you want to see great wildlife photography visit Moose Peterson’s site. His name says it all. I discovered this little fox, along with his brothers and sisters, on my way to the post office. I had my camera with me and thought I would try my hand at ‘Dancing with Wolves’. After a deliberately slow approach, I settled into a seated position and waited. I would yawn, blink, look away, etc; Everything you might learn from watching episodes of the Dog Whisperer. The one thing I didn’t do was immediately start shooting. After about 20 minutes, a reluctant mom let her kits out of the den. She didn’t let them walk up and sniff me, but they were allowed to make eye contact and observe me from a distance. I stayed there as long as a 1 gig CF card would let me (in 2002 that was a boat load of memory). Actually, I stayed a bit longer than that. It was an experience I will always remember.
Nikon D1x
Nikkor 80-200 2.8 AFD
Processing Notes
Capture
Photoshop (Curves Adjustment)
NIK (Sharpen selective to the eyes)
LightAsMagic.com
Tip: In a situation like this you might be tempted to open your lens up as wide as it will go to try and soften the background and emphasize your subject. However, at 2.8 in this case I was barely able to get the eyes in focus if I was focusing on the bridge of their noses. I think f/3.2 – 4 might have been a better choice.
On occasion, you just want to fill the frame with something interesting and click. This one was one of those times. The waves of clouds lit by the rising sun made everything on the ground meaningless, so I pointed my camera to the sky and……click. From my camera to your computers, with nothing in between.
Nikon D300
Nikkor 16-85 VR II
Processing Notes
Capture
Aperture (Raw Conversion)
LightAsMagic.com
Tip: To achieve a silhouetted foreground and a brilliant backdrop, you want to set your camera to capture the appropriate exposure for the sky which will leave your foreground dark and detail-less. To do this you can set your camera to ’spot metering’ mode, and meter for the sky. If you don’t have spot metering capabilities, you can use exposure compensation by reducing the metered exposure by several stops. Try making a couple image and review them in your LCD until you like what you see.
A Quick Boston Sunset, originally uploaded by LightAsMagic.
After a long day of walking the freedom trail we were rewarded with this georgeous sunset back at the room. This image was made with the Lumix TZ4 after a quick draw from the cargo pants. Photography of opportunity.
Note: With the TZ4 I ride the exposure copensation quite a bit. For this image I took 2 stops out.
Boston Fly, originally uploaded by LightAsMagic.
A day of bad weather and flat light drove us inside while visiting Boston. In line at the Museum of Science we ran into the CEO of the Michael Scott Paper Company. We didn’t bother him, it looked like he was pretty busy being a dad. We didn’t stay long. We were there just long enough to catch this little glimpse of summer.
Note: Shot with my trusty sub $200 Lumix TZ4.
