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Photo of the Day - August 2009

Doylem said:
Great light for bringing out detail in the stonework. Have the dresses changed colour, or am I going mad? I'd be tempted to crop off the figure on the far right...
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Completely mad, I'm afraid. ;)

OK, yes, they've changed color. I thought the white dress she was wearing blended in too much, so I opted for a costume change. I too am uncertain about the placement of the image of her on the far right, since it's so close to the edge of the frame. I don't want to nix that figure altogether because I think I need it for the sequence: she came, she saw, she left. Looking at the original shot, she was further to the left, and I've misplaced her; so I'll probably move her in my next round of edits...especially now that I know she's rubbing another set of eyes the wrong way.

And next in my bag of tricks: about twenty minutes in the life of a temple:

TempleTimeLapse7.jpg
 
The Wave - Coyote Buttes, UT



Another photo from my recent cross country trip. This is a rock formation known as "the wave" in Coyote Buttes, straddling the UT and AZ border.
 
panoz7 said:


Another photo from my recent cross country trip. This is a rock formation known as "the wave" in Coyote Buttes, straddling the UT and AZ border.
Click to expand...

It's pretty sad when you see pics on here from your own home state and you've never been there. Doh! Putting this on my list!

Today I decided to go with some texture...

krystal_mike_textured.jpg


Canon EOS 20D :: 45 mm TS :: f 4 :: 1/1000 sec :: iso 100
 
Sunflower

3844304411_8685d98fa3_b.jpg


Taken in my back garden this morning :)
Absolutely zero post processing...

Using Canon 60mm Macro

Camera: Canon EOS 450D
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture: f/3.5
Focal Length: 60 mm
 


I remember a Travel documentary I saw about 5 years ago on the BBC and it was asking people if they had one word to describe the Grand Canyon, what would that word be?

Most people's choice? "Awesome".

It's very true. Every time I visit the Grand Canyon I will always overhear people who wonder to the edge, take a moment to look over the vast canon and then exclaim, "Awesome". I admit that I have done the same thing.

But my favorite thing about this place is it's color. Like many of the famous wonders of the world, the Taj Mahal in Agra, India, the Pyramids in Giza, Egypt, etc, every hour in the Grand Canyon is a different experience as it is always changing color depending on where the sun is. The colors in the Grand Canyon are incredible unique especially at the 'magic hours' for Photography. I prefer the sunrise over the sunset in the Grand Canyon. It has this magical feel to it and everyone who has braved the cold and early hour to see it will just sit in silence and watch this great event. In fact I think it's the only time the Grand Canyon's tourists are quiet!

The above photo was taken at 5.30am just before the sun was about to rise over the horizon and these beautiful purples, magentas, blues, oranges and reds came together for this incredible mix. What you see here is pretty much what I saw there. I pumped up some of the vibrancy in the photo as it wasn't as accurate as I saw at that moment.

If you are at the Grand Canyon for an overnight stay, it's a must that you get up at sun rise to witness the beauty.

This was taken with my Canon 5D mk II with a 24-70mm F/2.8L with an aperture of F/8 (anything higher else was leaving glare on the image) for 0.4 second to grab this exposure.
 
Doylem: "Low cloud over Kirkstone Pass..."
I want to be 19 again and ramble down that road in my MGA
 
Urban to the HDR - Funky Find Tow



shot back in april on a photowalk in my city! funky find tow
 
Doylem said:
A fraction of a second in the life of a sheep...
Click to expand...

:D

sonor said:
Another one from Dartmouth...
devon090818_0247.jpg
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Nice treatment. Care to share what you did in post?

tonyeck said:

...But my favorite thing about this place is it's color. Like many of the famous wonders of the world, the Taj Mahal in Agra, India, the Pyramids in Giza, Egypt, etc, every hour in the Grand Canyon is a different experience as it is always changing color depending on where the sun is. The colors in the Grand Canyon are incredible unique especially at the 'magic hours' for Photography. I prefer the sunrise over the sunset in the Grand Canyon. It has this magical feel to it and everyone who has braved the cold and early hour to see it will just sit in silence and watch this great event. In fact I think it's the only time the Grand Canyon's tourists are quiet!

The above photo was taken at 5.30am just before the sun was about to rise over the horizon and these beautiful purples, magentas, blues, oranges and reds came together for this incredible mix. What you see here is pretty much what I saw there. I pumped up some of the vibrancy in the photo as it wasn't as accurate as I saw at that moment. ...
Click to expand...

Indeed, superb color. Do you have a shot taken a little later when you could see more detail in the foreground? I feel myself squinting at this shot, trying to make out the bottom half of it. The bottom half and the upper half don't cohere for this reason, and probably because of the composition, which essentially bifurcates the frame.

I have to agree with everything you said about the Grand Canyon. It's a very special place, especially during sunrise and sunset. I've made many visits myself and never seem to be any less awestruck upon approaching the rim each time.
 
romanaz said:
I can agree with you on that. This was shot @ ISO 3200, @ f/2.5 (If i remember correctly). The point was to be out of focus and just focus on the ball. Lighting sucked, but hey thats ok, because this was just a fun exercise at my friends house while we were playing drunken pool!
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If the pic didnt work out why not just delete it and learn from the experience?

mcavjame said:
I think what Nigrit0 means is why not correct what you can? Here is the same shot with noise reduction and color correction. It's good when the cue ball is white and the reduced noise helps to make the cue ball sharper. The noise reduction is done with Topaz Denoise filter for PS. It works better when you have the original raw file to process.
Click to expand...


That does look much better. I have been looking into getting a noise plugin, would you suggest Topaz's over NoiseNinja?



I guess i'll post a pic today...

Click for large on flickr.... It's worth it. ;)
 
NeGRit0 said:
That does look much better. I have been looking into getting a noise plugin, would you suggest Topaz's over NoiseNinja?
Click to expand...

I've heard a lot of good things from both but more about NoiseNinja working very well for most. Would like to hear from those that have used both and which works better or why one was favored over the other.

Also this is the screen shot from your photo that pops up ^^^

Cool, thanks!
 
Shot during a walk through Frognerparken (in Oslo).
Camera used is a Nikon D90 with a Nikkor AF-S 70-300mm VR (ƒ/11, 1/125, -0,5 EV, ISO 200).
 

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Phrasikleia said:
Nice treatment. Care to share what you did in post?
Click to expand...

OK. I'll try to remember what I did - I was making it up as I went along. I knew the look I wanted, but tried out different things and kept flattening it, so I don't have much to refer back to.

Original image looked something like this

20090818_0247demo1.jpg

​

In Camera Raw I added lots of fill light, balancing that by pushing up the black point...boosted clarity...boosted vibrance and cut saturation

20090818_0247demo2.jpg

​

Opened this up in CS3 and it gets a bit vague here...

Used just a touch of various filters to get some texture - Film Grain, Fresco, Cutout, Watercolour - subtle settings, low opacity...experimenting with different blend modes.

Boosted contrast at some point and desaturated a little.


20090818_0247demo3.jpg


​
 
C&C always welcome. On the banks of the Amazon river Santarem, BR

DSC_0517.jpg


18mm, f/4.5, 1/50, ISO 200
 
NeGRit0 said:
I have been looking into getting a noise plugin, would you suggest Topaz's over NoiseNinja?
Click to expand...

I hadn't used Noiseninja, so I downloaded the trial and did a little comparison. Here are my thoughts:
- they both do a really nice job on skin tones
- Noiseninja renders the file faster than Topaz with less odd shaped artifacting in really noisy areas.
- Topaz's interface seems more intuitive to me, but that may be familiarity
- I got denoise bundled with other Topaz plugins, so the value/cost seems a little better for Topaz

As an aside, when I filter noise, it is only one step in saving the image. Adjusting curves and levels does a lot to correct an image before noise is even addressed, so it looks like either will do the job.

For those that may ask why bother with the post, there are times when control over lighting is not possible or settings were missed and a return session is not possible. Recently I was shooting in a museum with a gary fong diffuser to avoid harsh shadows and reflections. In one area I could not get good light because an overhead structure was scattering the light in odd ways and I could not use a direct flash because of glass cases in the shot. I was able to rescue the image with curve adjustments and Denoise.
 
Noisy? You bet. On purpose? 100%

Waiting for my friend to take some tripod shots, I took a picture of his wife under the lamp post writing in her notebook.

writing_in_the_dark.jpg


Canon EOS 20D :: 45 mm TS :: f 2.8 :: 1/40 sec :: iso 3200 :: Monochrome w/Green Filter via Aperture
 
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