Nature
The moon is real. The hills are real. And so are the trees and the freshly worked field. But the photo is Photoshopped. So is the photo real? While I'm at it, I might as well ask if "moonset" is a real word?(PS: Have you adjusted your camera clock time to correspond to the shift away from DST? "Does time really matter?" you ask. My answer: "Metadata matters!")
I was out in the backyard looking for HDR (high dynamic range) opportunities. I was looking for subjects that had a broad contrast from very bright and very dark. The first thing I saw was an assortment of aspen leaves, which had just fallen during the night. I liked the how the backlighting accentuated the textures of the veins in the leaf and the blades of grass that surround it. It had frosted during the night, which adds a little more character to the bokeh in this photo.Canon 5DII 1/320s f/3.5 ISO200 100mm
I was going out to get something from my pickup truck when I noticed that the hosta leaves in a little garden patch outside our front door were backlit by the low sun. So, I forgot my original mission and went and got my camera. I think I took 30 photos but this one, after I cropped it, seemed to offer a good mix of the abstract with the real.By the time I was done taking photos, I had forgotten why I was heading to my truck! Is this evidence of genius or senility? Perhaps neither. . .
One of the good things about my job is that when I give a photo assignment I often go out and do the assignment myself. Such was the case this past weekend. My particular mission was to shoot an HDR photo or two. I have spent about 10 hours on this task and, of the 300 photos I took, I've ended up with one HDR composite that I like. That's not bad for a day's work!I have posted an HDR (High Dynamic Range) to this blog before but I thought I'd do it again. In simple terms, an HDR photo is really one or more photos of the exact same subject with varying exposures layered on top of each other and adjusted so the whole photo is well exposed - from the very bright to the very dark.In the case of today's photo, if I had exposed for the beautiful morning sky, the grass in the foreground would have been barely visible. And if I'd exposed for the foreground, the sky would have been washed out. I must admit that the way I've done HDR so far has an element of the surreal in it. And I like that.Incidentally, this photo has been selected as this year's choice for my LATI Festival of Trees donation. It will be among many things that are donated and offered during the silent auction for the annual LATI scholarship fundraiser on November 18 at the Ramkota.Finally, if you are still reading this, you may be seriously interested in HDR. If that's true, go here to see a YouTube video I made on this subject.
It looks like I'm in to looking up trees' trunks given this and yesterday's post. And I guess I am. . .This is a tree that our family named "Big Boy" over three decades ago. It lives on our cabin's property line in the Black Hills. It was old all those years ago so it is now Old + 30, I guess.Recently, Deb and I made the pilgrimage up the hill to see this venerable giant, in part to see if there is any evidence that Big Boy had fallen victim to the tree beetles that are killing trees all over the Black Hills right now. His boughs are green and he stands tall, though there was sap leaking out a hole a few feet up his trunk.We walked down the hill hoping that this huge pine tree wouldn't let a few small bugs bring him down.
We visited Brian and Katie this past weekend in St. Paul and this morning I felt obligated to go out and wander around for a while with my camera. I was looking for something other than fall color, and I found these little purple grapes on the wall of a townhouse not too far from Katie and Brian'sI like the color of the grapes contrasted with the brick wall behind. I also like the way the early morning light helps give dimensionality to the grapes. Finally, I like the way the depth of field gives depth to the photo. It is the combination of the blur and the good light that help the grapes stand out in this photo.
Here's another backlit leaf showing texture and character. Once again, I worked to compose this photo so that the lines in the leaves run slightly counter to the frame of the photo.
These bedraggled flowers represent the last color that survives in my wife's beautiful flower garden. Though they represent the end of summer and the eventual arrival of winter, there is still splendor in their blooms.
I was waiting for for a traffic light to change at a road construction site on the road between Hill City and Keystone. I rolled down the window and snapped this photo just as the light turned green. I'm a nature paparazzi.
Yes, it's Iron Creek again, which I call "the same old stream" in this post, though this capture tends to feature the same old rocks more than the stream.Frankly, I was surprised to see so much water flowing through the creek this late in the season (October 9). But even though there was pretty good flow, it took an 8 second exposure the get the smooth, fluid look that the water has.I love this place and will probably never stop photographing it, though I suspect I don't need to post any more photos of the place on this blog.And I should say that sometimes my photography has less to do with the result than it does with the act.(Watch the screencast on how I "made" this photo here.)
It was the perfect summer morning to be out north of Lake Okoboji in Iowa hunting for photos. This is one of the three captures I like for the hour I spent looking. I especially like the strong green color of the corn contrasting with the soft, muted color of the pre-sunrise sky.
This leaf, born sometime in May, is beautiful in its old age.