Charlotte in HDR

Charlotte,NC shot with iPhone 5 with App BRACKET which allows for two fast exposures across the exposure range and then combined and tweaked in TRUE HDR for the final result. Very cool, no ?
Enjoy, Jeff

HDR CLASSIC AUTOS

Shot today with an iPhone 5, olloclip wide angle lens, gorilla pod tripod, iPhone cable release and processed in TRUE HDR after shooting with Bracket App. The olloclip app was used last to correct wide angle distortion.

Enjoy, Jeff

Today's Gift

Today was a day of reflection. Noticing these mushrooms in our front yard growing at the base of our weeping willow gave me pause.  They are beautiful, but lethal,  being of the Amanitas species, one cap could kill a man of my size in less than 24 hours.  How could such a harmless looking fungus be so deadly?  Up close, it is beautiful. Note the off white color, the detail of the cap and stem.  This was shot using a Nikon D200 with a Minolta 50mm macro lens on a Tamron Adaptall mount, allowing the Minolta lens to work with the Nikon.  Exposure was done manually and the shot was handheld by me lying on the ground.  I estimate the f stop to be between 5.6 and 8.0.  Lightly edited in iPhoto and PS CS.  Ah, some of you will ask about the red leaf.  It was there in the front, I simply moved it to the back.

Enjoy, Jeff

 

The Wonderful World of Candid Portrait Photography

Great article on how to "candid portraits". My techniques are basically the same. Jeff

The Wonderful World of Candid Portrait Photography
http://fstoppers.com/the-wonderful-world-of-candid-portrait-photography

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Sent from Zite, available for free in the App Store.

  Jeff

Lake George from Prospect Mountain

One of the greatest tools of the modern iPhone is the ability to create a panorama. This can be done within the camera application or I think better yet, from using another camera application and then stitching the photographs in an application called AutoStitch. For this I use the application camera plus to take five overlapping photographs and then stitched them in AutoStitch. A little bit of cropping and then editing created the final result. Very easy to do and actually a much better result than the in camera panorama that is native to the iPhone.

Artsy Dancer

Blended two inverted images of the dancer using Image Blender App. Enjoy, Jeff

Bear Clan Pow Wow 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the second year I went to the Pow Wow.  These folks are willing photo subjects!  Great color, costumes and personalities. The first two images were shot with a Fuji F800 EXR at 500mm. The rest witha Nikon D200 And a Nikkor 18-135 Lens.  WB Auto, ISO 100-400. All edited in iPhoto.  Enjoy, Jeff

 

FUJI F800EXR TRIAL

 

 

 At 500mm!!

 

 

 

The Fuji F800EXR really solved my need for a pocket 28-500 zoom camera wioth an excellent lens and CMOS sensor.  These are my first shots with it today after golf at Western Turnpike Golf Course in Guilderland.

I am pretty impressed with the AUTO settings, WB, color and clarity.  They were minimally edited in iPhoto.  Enjoy, Jeff

The Morning Ride

The backlit photograph.

Early morning light with dew is a great opportunity to photograph even the simplest things such as grass or weeds. Notice the backlit effect highlighting and turning something ordinary into what I believe, is beautiful. In choosing to take a backlit photograph the point of exposure is critical, if you want to make a silhouette , you would expose where the light is coming in and everything in front will turn black . You can adjust the degree of blackness and the degree of high lit  edges by adjusting the exposure point

For this image I chose an exposure point toward the bottom third of the image that would allow one to see details in the plants and yet show the backlit subject

Queens Anne's lace field and backlit sun 

This to me has a sort of National Geographic landscape look. I saw this field of Queen Ann's lace partially backlit and the sun rays coming in over the trees in the background. What a great combination of foreground subject and background subject.

And again, I used the iPhone 5 Using camera plus to initially take the photographs, adding a clarity filter, further editing in Laminar with framing. Enjoy, Jeff

Lark Street Photo Shoot

Danny and Al, Martial Artists

 

Kee, Body Builder

These were taken today with my Nikon D200 and the standard 18-105mm Nikkor lens.  Shot in color, these portraits were then converted to Black and White using Topaz Adjust.  I started with the original Charcoal setting and did a lot of tweaking to get this result, similar to "Charles" in an earlier post.   My technique is to approach in a very friendly way, complement, make a little conversation and with permission, get their street portrait.

Enjoy, Jeff

 

Seashore Dream

Slow Shutter

I really enjoy this application, Slow Shutter for the iPhone. This was taken at a local amusement park where we took our grandchildren today. The tilt a whirl was rotating fairly quickly and I captured this at one quarter of the second exposure with a -1.75 exposure compensation so the image would not blowout. The image was edited in Laminar With levels and then Color burn blend mode. A small frame was added at the edges. Enjoy Jeff

iPhone fun in the supermarket

Ordinary shopping for food with Jeanette. Tons of flowers in the flower department. Excellent iPhone photo opportunity! I used SlowShutter to first take a still picture at 1/8 of the second and then a blurred picture at the same speed or picture occurred as I moved the camera over the flowers. Then the image was transferred to Laminar for further editing of curves and so forth and then ultimately to Snapseed for a little detail enhancement white balance correction and a frame
What a great way to have fun while food shopping! Enjoy, Jeff

Waiting

Southwest flight 3211 today. Waiting to disembark. I love the expression on the woman's face in front of me as her patience was a little tried. A fun grab shot with the iPhone 5. Enjoy, Jeff

Charles

I shot Charles in April of this year.  He was  on his bike in Washington Park, I on a bench.  I thought he was a very interesting subject and he agreed to be photographed.  I used a Nikon D200 with a 50mm 1.4 lens set at about f3.5 and composed him to the left of the frame.  Originally in color I converted the image using Topaz Adjust 5 to create a powerful look to an already powerful looking young man.  Enjoy, Jeff

Shooting People

There are many ways to shoot people on the street. My favorite is to meet someone who has a "look" that attracts me, engage them so that we both feel comfortable and then shoot. I simply feel better about this type of portraiture than sneaking a photo. Most importantly, I have made a connection with another person that elevates the photo experience for me. Enjoy, Jeff

Fuji Instax 210

In search of a modern Polaroid system, I discovered the Fuji Instax 210 camera. It is a lightweight but big and bulky plastic camera that uses Fuji instant film. This is not peel apart film but film similar to the later SX-70 Polaroid films. After snapping the shutter it develops in about one minute.

This was my first box of 10 prints shot with the image, I have selected a few which I photographed with my iPhone for uploading purposes. The major purpose of this camera for me right now will be to take photographs of my grandchildren and present them an actual physical print rather than having them looking at a computer screen or a cell phone screen to see their image. Hopefully they will learn to appreciate some of the older analog ways!

I certainly can see future artistic Uses of this camera, however they cannot be manipulated like the older versions of SX-70 film. I look upon this camera as another tool in a great, fun filled hobby.

Enjoy, Jeff

f1.4

Daisies around the corner.  Perfect opportunity to try the Nikon 50mm 1.4 lens Ari gave me for my birthday!!  All were shot at f1.4, ISO 100 and Tv of about 1/1000 sec.  The goal was to create a very shallow DOF, thus isolating the main subject and creating a complimentary blurred background. The first and third shots were edited as color images in iPhoto.  The middle in Topaz adjust using the preset bleach bypass. Enjoy, Jeff

  

 

 

 

 

 

SX-70 Experience

My great friend Cliff and I went to Vassar College today to see the SX-70 Exhibit.  The SX-70 was Polaroid's fantastic SLR introduced in 1972, that used "Instant Film".  This film, the malleable kind that could take up to 2 hrs to harden in warm temperatures was great to manipulate with a stylus.  Sadly, although SX-70 film is now made again by The Impossible Project, it is not the soft kind.  These are some of my shots taken with this film. I was GREAT fun!  Enjoy, Jeff

Newport 2003

Marine Shack AC

Lady Dawn AC Marina

EvianWaterNYC

cushmanmarine

BayouCafe 

SaratogaBurgers

Toasted Sunflower

Schaghticoke WaterGames

 Schahticoke Fair The Guesser

Marine Shack AC BW 

Grandpawoodstock

Lucy the Elephant