Simple Click – Where's the Movie?

At least, that’s what I asked when I saw this old truck parked at Cisco looking off to the south.

Simple Click – Where’s the Movie?

At least, that’s what I asked when I saw this old truck parked at Cisco looking off to the south.

I Just Love Trivia

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And to me, this wall is just a whole lot of trivia from our past. Because off that simple fact, it’s a black and white even though Hires was fire ball orange.

Winter Just Doesn’t Want to Let Go!

I don’t know about the rest of the country, but winter just doesn’t seem to want to give way to spring. Last week was just weird, coming home from the sunny southwest to pulling out the snow blower to clear the drive way. This week, we had one gorgeous day and then….

Today the wind turned cold, the clouds came over the crest and for a while it seemed like it wanted to snow. The skies were black, solid and threatening with the sun not to be found. Come on, I like snow but really, it’s time!

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Well finally late in the afternoon the clouds started to break. That’s when whether it winter, spring or summer, I love to be out and look up. The clouds were just flying by, it’s memorizing! Well, being tired of working on the computer, I grabbed the camera and headed out to the deck. I just chased around the clouds within the confines of our deck for a half an hour, making clicks thinking the whole time I would experiment more with my B&W technique to finish the images. While the clicks aren’t anything earth shattering, it felt good to get out, hopefully say good-bye to winter and know the B&W technique still works.

Photos captured by D3x, 18AF on Lexar UDMA digital film

Winter Just Doesn't Want to Let Go!

I don’t know about the rest of the country, but winter just doesn’t seem to want to give way to spring. Last week was just weird, coming home from the sunny southwest to pulling out the snow blower to clear the drive way. This week, we had one gorgeous day and then….

Today the wind turned cold, the clouds came over the crest and for a while it seemed like it wanted to snow. The skies were black, solid and threatening with the sun not to be found. Come on, I like snow but really, it’s time!

This movie requires Flash Player 9

Well finally late in the afternoon the clouds started to break. That’s when whether it winter, spring or summer, I love to be out and look up. The clouds were just flying by, it’s memorizing! Well, being tired of working on the computer, I grabbed the camera and headed out to the deck. I just chased around the clouds within the confines of our deck for a half an hour, making clicks thinking the whole time I would experiment more with my B&W technique to finish the images. While the clicks aren’t anything earth shattering, it felt good to get out, hopefully say good-bye to winter and know the B&W technique still works.

Photos captured by D3x, 18AF on Lexar UDMA digital film

New Technique = Blurry Eyes!

My eyes literally just can’t focus, wearing cheaters doesn’t even help! Photoshop CS5 packs a ton of new power, tools and possibilities and I just keep exploring them all in an attempt to find better answers for myself and ones I can share with you.

I have three goals in this process: speed, flexibility and quality. Quality is a given because without that then it’s all a waste of time. Speed, that’s become more and more important as my shooting has vastly escalated and when clicking landscapes, digital darkroom time increases but that’s not where I want to spend my time. So a faster workflow is a must. And flexibility, well, I don’t want to be locked into anything a year from now that I’ve done today. My style and tastes do change! So as Sharon says, “You in Class?”

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With finishing images from our Monument Valley adventure and getting all the lessons written and recorded to finish off the classes a top priority, I’ve been chained to the computer. I am very excited to have found a new B&W technique that fits my goals, runs at 64bit speed (which just rocks!) and all of it comes from right in CS5! No pluggins, no giant files and it really takes seconds. Gotta thank my bud Scott Kelby for giving me the start and my brilliant assistant Stephanie for providing a pivotal step. I like the results. Best thing, I can vary it slightly to give me slightly different tones in the B&W like you see above. I can’t wait to test/share it with folks next week at DLWS. And it will be on video shortly at Kelby Training. Excuse me now though, off to working on new techniques and classes.

Photos captured by D3x, 24PC-E / 70-200VRII on Lexar UDMA digital film

Simple Click – “Why Do You Stop in the Middle of the Road?”

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I think the answer is pretty obvious, my director didn’t appreciate it though

Simple Click – "Why Do You Stop in the Middle of the Road?"

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I think the answer is pretty obvious, my director didn’t appreciate it though

It Only Took 50yrs!

Yeap, Sharon & made it to Monument Valley for the first time today. This was our first view and it didn’t disappoint. We’ve seen many a beautiful image made here which has always pulled us in. We are very fortunate to be here with perfect photo weather and spring green just coming up.

Couldn’t have planned better if we wanted to. Even better, we’re here with a film crew from Kelby Training as we’re creating a two part Romancing The Landscape series. So you’ll be able to see all the successes and failures and explore this gorgeous place for the first time right along side us. It’s going to be a great week, well blog clicks as I go.

Photo captured by D3x, 70-200VR2 on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day3am – B&W

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The moment called for B&W.

All finishing done in CS5

Photos captured by D3x, 24PC-E on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day3am – B&W

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The moment called for B&W.

All finishing done in CS5

Photos captured by D3x, 24PC-E on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day2pm

When we park at the old rail warehouse and I gather the folks, there is a uniform look on their faces saying “WTF?” It happens every time with every group. This comes in part because many don’t understand how I go about “landscape” photography. It also comes in part because Keeler at first glance is anything but a photographic heaven. But once you let Keeler in….

You wouldn’t know it by the looks of the town now, but it was once the place where tons of gold was shipped and society was in full swing. The warehouse now stands quiet, time is its only visitor. That and us when I bring a group to town.

I don’t know what it is about these old TVs but they suck me in every time. I approached them differently this time and finished them differently and like these results but I know there is more here. I’ll be back.

The Shadows take over Keeler as the sun slips behind the Sierra fifty miles away. This is a another stop I wish I had tagged along with Fausto because he made images I’ve never seen come from this town. Stephanie headed out and made a couple of real sweet images as well, one with my 24PC-E that she borrowed from my bag. I can see that being an expensive loan in the time to come

It was near the end of the day when the group meet up with one of Keeler’s residents and they found the treasure that is Keeler that the goal of the afternoon was meet and a window into what I think landscape photography is all about that we found Keeler’s true gold. While I didn’t make the best images of the afternoon, I was rewarded just as much as the rest of the group with a simple stop at a simple place!

Photos captured by D3x, 24/45/85PCE on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day2am-2

Good thing the sun came up, it was my only possibility for redemption for the morning. Seriously, to blow such a killer opportunity, I loose sleep over those. Well, the sun came up and that great, killer skies for star trails became ouch for sun.

It is no wonder that one of the first shapes I saw in the rocks of Alabama Hills was that of an ass! Now to get the shot I needed the 16Fish to get the shape. To use that lens to get the shape, I had to be in the photo. That kinda took away from it all. Having CS5 and knowing what Content-Aware fill can do, I simple put the camera on Interval Timer, stepped out of the frame, had the camera take some clicks and then a quick finish in post. You can’t see the camera or tripod or where Content-Aware made them go away. Damn, freakin cool!

Not really moving too far, I came across this nose. Now I wanted to do a little HDR because it brings out some of the cool color in the rocks. CS5 does have a new HDR engine which does a good job but it’s too many steps for impatient me so I still prefer Photomatix Pro which I used here. Matt does a great job explaining CS5 HDR basics here so check it out.

And then back to plain and simple. I like plain and simple of after this morning, I could handle plain and simple. The finishing again was all done in CS5 using the technique Stephanie & I taught at Photoshop World, no pluggins, all CS5. Ah, this morning is over with, time to go lick my wounds and learn from my mistakes.

Photos captured by D3x, 16Fish / 45PC-E on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day1pm-2

And then I got sleepie. I don’t know why, it wasn’t like I tripped or fell or something, I just decided to look at the rocks like I was an ant. It was kinda fun!

The only real challenge was getting up and down. Na, nothing physical but rather the rocks are damn sharp! I used the pad from the strap of the sling bag to get up and down and not cut up my hand.

And to be real honest with ya, darn pleased with myself for this image. Not that’s it’s a killer photo but I like the illusion. The big ass looking rock on the right is about the size of a mellon! The thought just crossed my mind, “what if?” So I got down low and real close and well, there you go. Having fun while lying down on the job. What a perfect afternoon in the hills!

Photos captured by D3x, 16Fish on Lexar UDMA digital film

Eastern Sierra Adv day1pm

Well we left Laws with intentions of going up to Bristlecones but the road was closed past Sierra View. With just a wonderful group of adventurers, I took them to one of my favorite locations, Alabama Hills. This is a locale that is never the same hour to hour and as photographers, it’s always challenging us. This afternoon was no exception.

Now let’s be real honest hear, this is rock photography. Yeah, they are really cool, amazingly colorful and can take on any shape your imagination wants to assign, but they are still rocks. The challenge is, how to make them more then just rocks. It was a real challenge this morning because as you can see, there wasn’t a cloud, even a wisp of one in the sky!

I decided that since we had no shortage of blue sky that I would incorporate that as part of the design element in each photo. To do that, you guessed it, I knew I would be shooting to create B&W images. I enjoyed the challenge and at times, the rocks would win and other times, I won. Good to be pushed!

I actually really like this last image. I’m not really sure what originally caught my attention but I know I just threw the lens up to this arrangement. It’s just rocks, just a design element, but for me, it works.

Here again, all of these images, from noise reduction to B&W finishing was all done with CS5 and NO pluggins.

Photos captured by D3x, 24/45 PC-E on Lexar UDMA digital film

The Maisel Challenge

Last week at the Art of Digital (PSW), Jay Maisel had an image that was kinda cool and his only comment to it was, “I was so happy I captured a snow flake.” Wow, that was just down right cool. Then the thought struck me, “Hey dork, you live where it snow A LOT! Where’s your photo of a falling snow flake?”

Snow, it was snowing today and being stuck behind the desk, it wasn’t until near the end of the storm I remembered the challenge.

I grabbed the 24f1.4 AFS for this project. I thought its narrow DOF would help isolate the snow flake. There is actually one pretty darn sharp here but the problem is, even with the minimum DOF, you can’t see it. How did I shoot at f1.4 in sunlight? I dialed the ISO down to L1 so I had a shutter speed of 1/8000.

And in this photo, I have a whole bunch of sharp snow flakes but you can’t see them. And there lies the biggest and now most obvious problem. The snow flakes are white and against the white sky, you can’t see them. Duh! So, while I failed the Maisel challenge I feel I came out ahead because in the next storm, I have two pieces of the puzzle required for success. Doesn’t mean I’ll win next time either with that information, but I’ll be closer. That’s how my photography tends to evolve and slow and easy wins the race.

Photos captured by D3s, 24f1.4AFS on Lexar UDMA digital film

Simple Click – Errands

I’m about to be on the road for a month, literally, will only see the house 4 days in March. And yeah, I miss it when I’m not there. The Sierra is a special place, where the folks and the land welcome you like few other places on the planet. I’m leaving with about 12′ of snow in the front yard, not a great year but not a bad one either. As you might imagine, there are a number of basic household chores that have to be done prior to taking off and in snow country, there are a few extra.

There are those little things like having kindling split and wood brought it and fire laid in the fireplace for when we get home. Nothing says being home in the winter like having the fire glowing in the fireplace.

There’s the things unique to Mammoth like hauling the trash down to the collection center as there is no street trash collection because of the snow. I guess some time in the past some city snow plower hit a trash can on the street and sent it flying over the landscape. Must of been one helluva site!

But no matter the chore, the camera goes with me. All these photos were taken within the city limits, literally from the streets themselves. These are the scenes I see just running these various house chores.

Do I go out of my way to get the photo while running my errands? What do you think? When I see the light, when I see the scene, the old F250 gets me any amount of snow to get the shot. In this case, I knew where these trees are and have been waiting for the right combination of light and cloud to make the shot. So up the hill I drove, up the snow I climbed to make the shot. And yeah, to me it was worth it. I love running errands!

Photos captured by D3s, 50f1.4 AFS on Lexar UDMA digital film

Chasing the Comin Storm

I’m a weather watcher, I’m a weather chaser, I’m a weather shooter! Our home in the Sierra affords me plenty of opportunities to follow my heart and passion for weather. The mix of location, weather and a nack for reading it keeps me jumping at times. This last storm came in during the afternoon which can lead to dramatic light. I drove just shy of 100 miles, never being more than 15miles from my home literally chasing the light.

Here’s a Gallery of my 9 Favorites from the chase.

Photos captured by D3s, 70-200VR2 / 24PC-E on Lexar UDMA digital film

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