First Leaf of Fall

 

 

 

 

Evening on our Street

I had a few minutes around sunset to walk down our street try to find some photo opportunities.  The first one is a tall cattail like plan that our neighbor has and I was able to get under it and catch the last colors of a cloudless sky in the background.  I only "tuned" the photo a little and cropped it. (f5.6, 1.5 sec. shutter speed, ISO-100)

In the second photo, I merged four shots that were taken from a tripod.  Then I turned the saturation way down and turn up the blue to get this look.  I also had to remove a lot of power lines and lampposts.  (F27, 10 sec shutter speed, ISO-100)

Sun Dog (Parhelia)

My daughter spotted a Sun Dog today, which apparently has several names like Halo, Pathelia or Mock Sun.  The most interesting thing to me, was the multiple rings.  I ran the F-stop number as high as I could to reduce the size of the sun glare.  (F22, 1/500 shutter speed, ISO-100).

Duck In Flight

This is my best attempt so far at catching one of the local ducks in flight.  I had some trouble getting the contrast right between the duck (which was originally underexposed) and the water (which was a little bit overexposed). (F5.6, 1/180 sec. shutter speed, ISO-100)

Ghost Walkers

The right combination of light, walking speed and shutter speed led to this picture.  My girls think it makes me look like a ghost hunter.  I started focusing on the shiny motocycle that someone had left parked in a well lit area with interesting reflections.  Then I noticed that I could get ghost images of people walking by the bike, which made a nice contrast between the two modes of transportation.  (f27, 2 sec., ISO-100)

Evening on the Town

Our photography class went to an area of town where there are outside cafes and other activities in an open market area.  Here are a couple of photographs where I kept the shutter open long enough to catch some motion and some of the warmness of the evening sun. (f9.5, 1/4 sec, ISO-100)

 

In this second one, I liked the combination of motion and reflections.(f5.6, 0.7 sec, ISO-100)

 

I went back to the duck pond this evening, but I could not get there til the sun was almost too far gone.  In this picture (F-22, 1/2 sec., ISO-100), I not only added some saturation, hue and tint, but I also blackened the shadows some and I actually reduced the clarity to give it a softer look.  I'm still experimenting with exactly what time of day to shoot and how much tuning to do in Photoshop Elements.

Ducks By The Pond

I was able to get a few pictures of some ducks in the late afternoon sun (about 30 - 40 mins before sundown.)  My daughter really likes the oversaturated color of one of the ducks.  Thanks to my real-life instructor and the on-line instructors that have drilled into me how much better the lighting is just after sunrise and just before sunset.  I missed some other good poses, because I tried to use slower shutter speeds.  My "successful" shots were all taken at 1/180.  I took some at 1/125 that were almost well-enough focused and the 1/45 was way too slow.  If I had been using a tripod the 1/125 may have worked.  I was using an F-stop of 4.5 because I wanted a relatively shallow depth-of-field.  I was using my zoom lens at 200 mm and ISO 100.

Melting Cars

We were driving away from the sun and got a hill in between us and the sun.  The traces paralleling the cars and road surface that give the appearance of melting came from using a combination of fill light, blackening and vibrance.  F/2.8, 200 mm, ISO 100, 1/125 shutter.

Flag on a Cloudy Night

I was looking for interesting night sky shots and decided to shoot straight up beside our flag.  I was using my standard wide angle lens that came with the camera whose lowest f-stop is f/3.5, which I set to 18 mm (zoomed out as far as it would go.)  With ISO-200, I had to leave the shutter open 30 sec to get the sky.  On a previous shot the flag wasn't bright enough, so for this shot, I shined a small flashlight on the flag for about 1 sec.  There was no post processing on this image other than a little bit of cropping.

Ant's Eye View

My girls call this the Ant's Eye View of the world.  I sat the camera directly on the brick wall and used f/3.5 and an 18 mm lens to get the short depth of field and the feeling that the viewer (Ant) is actually moving into the scene.  The other settings were 1/15 sec. and ISO-100.  It was late afternoon in a sort of wide alley between buildings so there was no direct light, which really helped.

American Flag

We proudly fly the flag at our house, and I'm constantly trying to find ways to capture it.  (f/2.8, 1/60, ISO-100, 92mm focal length.)

Headed to Church

My girls like this photograph because they say the church looks like a painting.  I like the double reflection on the side of the van.  I took two exposures and merged them using Photoshop Elements 10.  For both pictures I used f/27 and ISO-100 to get maximum depth of field and low noise.  The darker exposure I used to get the sky was 1/4 sec and the brighter photo was taken with a shutter speed of 0.7 secs.  I only had my standard lens that came with my Pentax K10D.  It was set to 21 mm focal length.  The White Balance was set on Daylight.

Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear

Recently, I was on a business trip and decided to take my good camera on the plane, just to see what I could catch.  They seated me behind the wing and only a couple of seats in front of the engine (rear-engine plane.)  I tried several times before I got my neck to twist around far enough to get this photo. I used f/4 and 1/250 shutter speed (the slowest speed recommended by our instructor for photos from flying platforms) and ISO-200.  We were headed into the rising sun at about 6:30 am, but I still went into Picasa and added saturation (and I may have "warmified" it also -- I can't remember.)  This picture is one of my personal favorites, but I'm not real sure why.

On the same trip I took some photos while looking forward over the wing.   I broke the rule and kept the shutter open for 1/4 of a second.  I used f/4.5 and ISO-400 because this picture was taken very early (about 6 am, I think).  The colors in the picture are much bluer than they were in reality, because of my white balance setting.  But our instructor says that if we call it art, then we can take license with the colors.  So, I'm calling it art.

Reflected Images on Cars and Photoshop Elements

Here lately I've been noticing some reflections on cars parked next to our house.  Also, I've found that some of the Photoshop Elements effects really help focus on the reflection more than the car.  The first one is a daytime reflection of our flag on the side of a Mini-Cooper.  The image on the left is simply cropped.  The settings were f/8, 1/45 shutter speed and ISO-100.  Note that in addition to the flag reflection, there is a reflection of a flower bush on the roof.  I used Fluorescent Chalk in Photoshop Elements 10 to create the image on the right.  I like the way it brings out the flag.

The second is a nighttime reflection on a minivan of our porch and windows.  From some angles, the reflections look like they are inside the van rather on the surface, almost a 3-D effect.  I used f/2.8, 30 secs for the shutter speed (obviously on a tripod -- also used a remote control to keep it from shaking the camera) and ISO-100.

 The blue tint in Picasa 3 was added so that the porch reflection is easier to see.  It makes it look like you could walk right into it.  I also think of it as the way that the van sees our house at night.

I tried Fluorescent Chalk Photoshop on this image also.  To me, it makes it look even more like you could walk right up on this porch.

Silhouettes using backlighting

 The other day, my girls and I started experimenting with backlighting or silhouettes. I stood behind them and had them aim a flash at a blank wall in front of them. The room was completely dark otherwise.

I set the camera to f/13, 1.35 second shutter speed for the one on the left (f/22 and 2 sec for the one on the right), and ISO-100. I was about 3-4 feet behind them and the wall was only about a foot in front of them. Then I went into photoshop elements and selected the Carving effect to get the second photo. The Neon effect in Picasa also produced some interesting looks. I am looking for good ways to print or present the Carved versions



Figure out how good of a photographer you are.

http://improvephotography.com/4695/give-yourself-an-honest-portfolio-review/

I found this website very useful for someone like myself.  Some people find it too negative, but many others found it helpful.

"I TOLD YOU WE LIVE TOO CLOSE TO OAK RIDGE!"

There are probably several good captions for this photo that have to do with living near Oak Ridge.  I took the picture from the top of the Market Square Garage in Knoxville, TN.  I used the Heat Map feature in Picaso to get this effect.  The settings on my camera were ISO-100, F/2.8 and 1/350 shutter speed.  It was set at 70 mm and I did a lot of cropping.  I would like it if someone came up with a great caption.

My photography instructor's blog

Vegas Building Reflection

I got a chance to make an easy building reflection picture in Vegas recently.  I only had my Droid2 smart phone (that died shortly afterward), but the picture still came out pretty well.  The details are shown below and a cropped version of the picture is shown to the left.  Wish I had my good camera on this trip.

Catching Tinker Bell in Flight

The other night, my girls and I decided to try to capture Tinker Bell on camera. My photography teacher introduced us to the idea of turning off all light sources and then putting the camera on the B (Bulb) Mode, which means that the camera shutter stays open as long as you hold down the Shutter Release Button. That allows you to do art work with lights (flashlights, etc.)

My girls both really enjoyed helping. They would take turns operating the overhead lights while the other one did the artwork with the Tinker Bell penlight.

Hopefully, once I’ve had few more lessons, we can make an even better photo. And once I find my Cable Switch, I can let them run the camera, while I get to be the artist.  Pictures were taken July 2012.