Sep 1, 2011 | Landscape Photography
A very popular image in our landscape gallery is this image of a storm hitting Battery Point in Nor Cal. One question I seem to get a lot is, “How hard is it to get the timing down to capture the light beam?” When I say it’s impossible, I get the strangest looks and after a moment the statement comes back, “But you did!” Actually, no I didn’t! The light on a lighthouse comes on when? Just before dark and stays on during the NIGHT, it’s not on during the day. Some do come on during a dark day when there is fog, but on this day there was neither. So then how did I get the light beam? I made it in Photoshop. Along with my dear friend Joe Sliger, we invented the technique in Photoshop to create a light beam. That’s because with out it, it’s just a house on a rock. You wanna lighthouse, you gotta have a light! There is no romance in a house on the rocks. Like all great images, romance comes from the light!
What always gets me is, and I’ve been told I should take it as a compliment, but no one ever notices the waves. Waves don’t break around a rock all the same time, they break on sections as the wave moves towards the shore. And, on an overcast day, waves are gray, not white. But that’s the beauty of our minds, when there are pieces that it can latch onto as being “real” then it just fills in the rest of the pieces as being real. The beam of light and the extra waves I added to make this photograph complete, all just go with the scene. I wish I were that good or that lucky to capture all of this in one click, but that’s not the case. But I do know the limitations of the click to know what pieces I need to add to finish a photograph. And that’s just some of what you’ll learn at…
Here it is plain and simple, I want to help folks with their photography and the vehicle we’re going to use in this class is Photoshop to help improve your captures! And we’re going to do that by using Photoshop to learn how to be better at the camera and the computer. We’ll talk camera settings and lenses, curves and exposure, Silver Efex Pro and lenses, HDR and composition. They go hand in hand and knowledge of both is so important I feel to get what you see and feel reaching the heartstrings you’re sharing your photography with. And that’s the end game to all of this, grabbing heartstrings.
One of the unique things we provide you is a 14pg Location Shot list. We want you to shoot while you’re here but shooting is not part of the class. So to encourage this, we provide ideas of places to shoot, when to shoot there and how to find it for shoots around the Mammoth area. One of the locations we provide info to for you to shoot at is Bodie. This class offers this and so much more!
Wanna learn more….click here…or simply call WRP @760.924.8632 or 661.204.1506. Next workshop is 8-9 Oct, 2011 (couple of seats open).
Aug 29, 2011 | Landscape Photography
I had gotten word of this and wasn’t sure how I could spread the news. Until I saw the USA Today ran the story today on their iPad edition. This just boggles my mind. For those who don’t know that a Whimbrel is, it’s a big shorebird about the size of your basic park pigeon but just with longer legs and bill.
Aug 11, 2011 | Landscape Photography
This is not a great photo, not really good enough to be put in a slideshow but it felt soooooo good to just get out and click. It has been five days and I’ve not done anything really photographic so headed to Mono Lake this AM. It turned out to be a 600 click morning, did strike gold after putting in a little time but I’ve not edited all those images yet. The water level of Mono Lake is up which is great to see but some old favorites are feeling the pinch for real estate. The grasses which are normally a big carpet are smaller and by the time I got to them (I was shooting birds) the sun was up. I wanted to a simple click to just record the small patch. This is a 5 image hand held HDR with a little Glamor Glow & Silver Efex Pro. mtc
Photo captured by D3x, 24-120VR on Lexar UDMA digital film
Aug 10, 2011 | Landscape Photography
A very long time ago, I was told that once the subject or we leave the ground, the rules of light change. That’s because the physical relationship, the angles of sun, subject and camera change. It’s why you can photograph a bird or plane in flight have less contrast when shot the same time of day as a subject on mother earth. It’s really a mind boggling concept when you start thinking about it. Move the subject up towards the sun and the contrast lessons. This is not to say there is no contrast issues, just lesser. Now when you head up and shoot back down towards earth, on man, the possibilities are endless and your time to make magic seemingly forever.
Even with that being true, just being up doesn’t mean you can do no wrong. The play of light on the landscape still is what brings drama to the photograph. Flying up to Oshkosh last week, we played dodgeball with thunderstorms. Our pilots did an expert job of it making for some amazing photo opps. In the top photo you can see the effect of the God Beams painting light down below. The bottom photo is the one I like the best thought. The combination of the 206’s wing, down pour top center, low puffies in the lower left and the light break the whole experience together in a single click. I realize this is not everyone’s cup of tea, from being in a small aircraft at 8000′ to shooting aerials. But it’s another form of light many don’t think about nor take advantage of. It’s all part of photography, waiting to be experienced and then if it works for your style, to be embraced.
Photos captured by D3x, 16Fish on Lexar UDMA digital film
Aug 5, 2011 | Landscape Photography
OK, now we’ve got something working. A little 5 image hand held HDR, a little Content Aware fill and I have a clean image.
I would have loved to have this storm over the salt flats or Great Salt Lake, but that’s not what I had. I had great clouds, great light and great fun chasing them. Perfect evening!
Aug 5, 2011 | Landscape Photography
Looking out the window at dinner I see a down pour to the north and looking east, it was dry. Freakie! But I knew that thunderstorm was forming. Leaving the restaurant I looked south to see this thunderhead. Great cloud! Suckie foreground! Gotta move…now!
We head southeast looking for a good foreground. Sharon stopped me from climbing a construction crane behind a fence so kept on moving. We find a little parking area with trees. Click. Light is moving and I need to move. So glad I have a camera with me. I love a good challenge!
Photos captured by D3x, 24-120VR on Lexar UDMA digital film
