Spring Means JD’s Garden #7

I like two things about this photo:  the strong contrast in colors and the very narrow shallow depth of field.  Both make the subject come forward in the photo.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 300mm f/4 with a 1.7x teleconverter (effectively a 500mm lens), ISO 1,600, f/6.7 and 1/180^th of a second on a tripod.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast, adjusted hue and saturation of green, yellows and orange and added vignette and cropped image into a square.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #6A

As usual, the professor was right.  Here I did a little dodging and burning to bring Herb's face forward in the photo.
Enjoy.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #6

Met Herb (that’s what JD calls this lizard).  Herb climbs out on this flower every evening and surveys his kingdom.  Actually, he sits there and waits for flying bugs to get close—after all, a guy has to eat!

To me, this photo is more about the complementary colors of green and orange than it is about Herb and his perch.  So, I chose an aperture that would only allow Herb’s face to be in focus.  I wanted the rest of the photo to be about muted shades of orange and green.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 300mm f/4 with a 1.7x teleconverter (effectively 500mm),  ISO 800, f/8 and 1/60^th of a second on a tripod.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and adjusted hue and saturation of green and orange.

Photoshop CS5—sharpened Herb’s face using the high pass filter method.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #5

This photo is totally about the lines—both those in focus and those that are not in focus.  I wanted the image to show the different greens within the frame.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6, ISO 200, f/8 and 1/15^th of a second on a tripod with an SB800 with a snoot and triggered by PocketWizard Flex.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and adjusted hue of green.

Photoshop CS5—sharpened leaf using the high pass filter method.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #4

In this photo, I was not doing much besides trying to see what the Nikon 28-300 f/3.5.6 could do more-or-less as a macro lens.  I wanted to capture all the details of the flower and yet make the background to be slightly soft.

Overall, I liked the results and was surprised that I could get the background as soft as it is at f/38.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6, ISO 200, f/38 and two second on a tripod with an SB800 with a snoot and triggered by PocketWizard Flex.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and adjusted hue of green.

Photoshop CS5—sharpened flower using the high pass filter method.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #3

I found this little guy when I was trying to adjust my flash for a photo of a flower.  I immediately turned and tried to get as close as possible to him.  As it turned out, the photo is cropped version (about one third of the entire frame).  I really like the contrast in colors.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6, ISO 200, f/22 and one second on a tripod with an SB800 with a snoot and triggered by PocketWizard Flex.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and adjusted hue of green.

Photoshop CS5—sharpened bug using high pass filter method.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #2

Here I was captivated by the way the light was falling on the two leaves.  I tried to figure out what was causing it but never could.  I really like how much contrast there was between the two leaves in the front compared to the rest of the photo.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 300mm f/4, ISO 800, f/22 and 1/20^th of a second on a tripod.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and adjusted hue and saturation of certain colors.

Photoshop CS5—dodged and burned areas of the photo.

Spring Means JD’s Garden #1

It’s spring so that means I spend many hours walking about JD’s plants looking for something that catches my eye.  I was photographing the leaves a plant when I looked across the driveway and noticed how the water from the sprinkler system spayed across the leaves of the plant that was backlit.

I  tried various shutter speeds and finally settled on 1/90^th of second.  I thought that gave the best streaking effect.

Enjoy.
Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 300mm f/4, ISO 800, f/13 and 1/90^th of a second.
Post Processing:  
Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

Walking around Downtown Houston #5

Today’s photo is different from most street photos that I present—it is in color.  I must admit when I think of street photography, I think black and white.

This man was cleaning the rails downtown for the train.  I have no idea as to why they need to clean the rails, but they evidently do.  Here I was attracted by the colors reflecting off the buildings.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8, shot at 200mm, ISO 200, f/2.8 and 1/180^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

Walking around Downtown Houston #4

Vacation is over.  No, I have not really been on vacation, but I did take a little sabbatical from my blog.  Yes, I had lots of work however I could have found time to do a few posting during the month.  Just lazy, I guess.

To me, today’s photo is a classical street photo—it depicts a classical human topic:  husband and wife “debating” over something with each doing his/her thing without regard to the other. 

I kept the composition simple.  I wanted the two people be the focal point of the image.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6, shot at 300mm, ISO 800, f/8 and 1/180^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

  nik Silver Efex Pro 2—converted image to black and white, added orange filter and vignetting.

Walking around Downtown Houston #3

I was studying the columns and thinking about what sort of photo I wanted to take when this guy starts walking into my frame.  I was immediately struck by the way he was holding his hands.  I thought that the rhythm of the light colored columns contrast nicely with the dark clothing of my star.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 70-300mm f/3.5-5.6 shot at 170mm, ISO 200, f/5, 1/250^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted mid tone contrast.

Nik Silver Efex Pro 2—Converted image to black and white.

Walking around Downtown Houston #2

This is the old Texaco Building.  I always liked the architecture of this building.  It has very classical lines.  It is now abandoned.  Not sure what will happen to it but I am hoping that someone will see what a great old building it is and saves it.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 70-300mm f/3.5-5.6 shot at 80mm, ISO 1,400, f/8, 1/180^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted mid tone contrast.

Nik Silver Efex Pro 2—Converted image to black and white.

Walking around Downtown Houston #1

I had a job in downtown Houston last week.  After the job was over, I decided to wait and let the rush hour traffic subside (as if you can in any big city in America).  I put my lights, etc in the car, armed my camera with my Nikon 70-300 lens (one of my favorites for street photography) and started walking around downtown Houston.

For 40 years, my old firm had offices in downtown Houston and I spent a lot of hours, days, weeks, months and years in downtown Houston.  But, I must admit, I had NEVER just walked around looking at buildings, streets and the “going-on” until the other day.

The shapes and distorted reflections of these two buildings caught my eye.  I converted the image to black and white in Lightroom 3.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 70-300mm f/3.5-5.6 shot at 80mm, ISO 360, f/11, 1/180^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted luminosity of orange, yellow, blue and cyan to effect contrast of black and white image, and added a strong curves adjustment.

A Little Street Photography

I know that I am getting old when I see a pair of tight blue jeans, filled with a lovely young lady walk past me and all I could think of is: "boy, I bet those blue jeans are really uncomfortable."  Yep, getting old!

Enjoy.

Assemble the Skyline #6

This is my final posting of the band.  I submitted this photo for Bay Area Photo Club’s March assignment of blur.  The blur is totally achieved in the camera.  In fact the only things done in Photoshop was sharpening all the eyes and converting the photo to black and white.

The blur was caused by the band swaying back and forth while using a slow shutter speed and two Elinchrom strobes that were fired in rear-synch mode.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3 on a tripod, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 shot at 70mm, ISO 100, f/19, 1/6^th of a second with two Elinchrom strobes with a silver umbrellas.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted color.

Photoshop CS5—sharpened the eyes of all the band members and used nik Silver Efex Pro to convert photo to black and white.

Assemble the Skyline #5

Max is the band’s lead singer and from what Steve tells me, he is really good.  Near the end of our shoot, Max sat down in front of one of the amps.   There was light from the windows on his backside.  I feathered an SB800 on his face.  I wanted the light to be just on his face.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 shot at 70mm, ISO 800, f/6.7, 1/30^th of a second with an SB800 with a small silver umbrella and triggered by Pocketwizard Maxi.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted color.

Photoshop CS5—use nik Silver Efex Pro 2 to convert to black and white and add frame.

Assemble the Skyline #4

Austin was really into the song that the band was playing.  I tried several different angles and finally settled on this one.  What I like about this one is:  Austin’s expression, the lighting and the angle.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 shot at 48mm, ISO 800, f/4.8, 1/60^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set white and black point and adjusted color.

Assemble the Skyline #3

Sometimes, I like a photo but do not know why I like it.  That’s the case with this photo of Luke.  It is a very simple photo, yet I find myself studying it.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 shot at 60mm, ISO 800, f/8 1/60^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—set white and black point and added mid tone contrast.

Assemble the Skyline #2

This is Nick, the drummer for Assemble the Skyline.  Of all the members of the band, he had the most definite ideas about how he wanted the photos to be.  Here he strikes a pose over his drums.  I like how relaxed he appeared and the overall contrast between the environment and him.

This photo was taken using my new PocketWizard Flex TT5s in iTTL mode.  I used two Nikon SB800 with umbrellas, positioned high right and left.  In addition, I had an Nikon SB800 mounted on the top of my PocketWizard Mini TT1, which was used as the master to control the other two flashes.  The flashes fired virtually every time.  However, I do believe there will be some learning curve on how best to use them.

Here, I think the flash add just enough light to bring Nick forward, add just enough light to the background to blend with the light outside of the window.  Overall, I think the lighting works.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8, shot at ISO 800, f/8 and 1/90^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

Assemble the Skyline

Meet the boys of the band, Assemble the Skyline.  The boys are from left to right:  Austin, Luke, Nick and Max.  Steve and I had the pleasure of shooting the band last Friday.  It was a great shoot.

Why?  Well, to begin with, the guys are really fine young men.  They were willing to do anything that Steve or I asked them to do.  So naturally, we tried all sorts of new things.  Second, I got to play with my new Pocketwizard triggers.  I was impressed with their performance, but must admit there is a learning curve with them.

This photo is all natural light.  It was behind the stage in Galveston.  I wanted the photo to have a behind the scenes look so I used the stage hangers as props to frame the band.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 shot at ISO 800, f/8 and 1/350^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom 3—Set black and white points, cropped photo and added a vignetting.

Photoshop CS5—used nik Silver Efex Pro to convert the photo to black and white.