Love the new look to the site. Good luck with it. Bookmarked just moments ago.
Thanks, fcortese! I hope to see some familiar people in the comments once I begin posting articles.
Beautiful balance of light, and such a lovely waterfront. Terrific photo, Reef!
Glad you think so.
A late fall sunset with a birds moving just before evening hour.
This photo makes me want to be there. Lovely atmosphere and great timing with the flock of birds.
Photographing Blackwell is a good winter project for me. The lighting is done very well, to pick out some of the design details; factor in all the light coming in through the windows at different times of the day, and there are so many different pix to take. I'll enjoy the process, and learning more about balancing the light sources. I could use HDR, I suppose, but even the slightest 'HDR look' puts me off.
Oh, and your website looks very good...
This place must be enormous...one luscious space after another. If money were no object, the house I would build would be in the Arts-and-Crafts style. In fact, I think I would just commission a duplicate of this Blackwell house of yours.
Oh, and thanks for the compliment about my website.
Congratulations on your new web design Phrasikleia...very well done! I'm looking forward to reading your photography articles.
Btw, I love the Bio and Artist statement page. It's so nice to know the background of an artist when you admire and respect their work. The photo of you is a an added bonus...after all, we tend to be a visual group.
Thanks a lot for saying that, Cheese&Apple.
What a great catch! I've seen a lot of great bird photos, but I don't recall ever seeing one where the bird looks like he just came from a pie-eating contest!
Adorable and very well done.
...in the meantime here is one from ages ago!
I remember commenting on this one when you posted it years ago. I still like it!
The revamped site looks very good, well laid out, a modern contemporary feel, nice and simple but professional. A good foil to your pictures.
After reading your FAQ's I now have to go forth and investigate single shots using luminosity masks thoroughly, thank you!
I love the line of the cloud across the latest picture you posted here, is that mothership following you?!
Can I ask a huge favour and a question of you? With the library shot I took the other week, if I was to attempt this as a single shot and use luminosity masks to reveal some more content; would you favour the shadows or the highlights in regard of exposure and why? Or should I just follow my light meters suggestions and then swing slightly to the highlights or the underexposure depending on which I want to prioritise for? (Not the camera, an actual light meter). I would of course bracket my shots for safeties sake so as to choose the best exposure at home.
Thanks for your comments about the site, ijohn. To answer your question, I almost always privilege the highlights in a photo, since the eye is most attracted to the brighter areas of an image. Also, lifting shadows tends to increase noise, so I try to "expose to the right" in tricky exposure situations where bracketing isn't possible. I seem to recall that your photo of the library included a lot of hanging lamps, which, as direct light sources, are likely to have no highlight detail; if so, I would just let them clip and worry about the highlights that do have detail. I hope I've understood your question!
P, the new site looks great!
Thanks, Lumberman.
I posted the wrong shot. This is the only one with that line. I presume it must be flare, though it looks more like something a spider might make...
Probably the latter, since there is also a line at the top that goes down diagonally from the rafters. During a 15-sec exposure, the spiderwebs were probably swaying in a draft and picking up light at multiple points, making them look thicker than they are. At least that's my best guess!
Also, ijohn
here is a good tutorial to start with the masks that another user shared here. I forget who though.
I just skimmed the tutorial at that link. His approach is a bit different from what I would recommend. It looks as though he's using the luminosity mask on a curves adjustment layer, but you'll get better results if you use it on a Smart Object that is a raw file processed for the highlights, with a second raw file beneath it that is processed for the shadows. That way you'll be pulling more out of your raw data. Just my $0.02.