Sunflower

I shot this sunflower this morning at the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center in available light under a bright overcast sky at about 8:30 am.

Camera Data: Canon 40D, 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM set at 70mm through a 500D close-up lens, f/2.8, 1/1600 sec, ISO 100, Av mode at Ev = -0.33.

Post: Square cropping, tonal adjustments, vibrance, and mid-tone contrast in Adobe Camera Raw 5.5. Highpass sharpening and framing of JPG in CS4.

-CGTTL

Water Snake?

Water snake?

Camera Data: Canon 40D, EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM, 500D, Av mode, f/2.8, 1/30 sec, ISO 200, Ev=-0.33, on a tripod.

Water snake? No, water hose.

-CGTTL

Yellow Trumpet Bush Flower

I got a shot of this lovely yellow trumpet bush flower in our garden, after a short rain late this afternoon. The actual diameter of the blossom is about 1 inch.

It was shot from a tripod in available light with an EOS 40D camera, through a 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens (plus a 500D close-up lens) set at 145 mm (232 mm equivalent), f/2.8, 1/50 sec, and ISO 100 in aperture priority mode at an Ev of - 1/3 stop. Cropping, tonal adjustments, selective lightening, and selective sharpening were done in post processing, using CS4.

The background is a black cloth vest hung from a coat hanger on a small flash stand about a foot behind the flower.

-CGTTL

Chimney Swifts

This image of hundreds of Chimney Swifts, returning to their current home in the incinerator chimney at Pershing Middle School in Houston, was shot between 7:45 and 8:00 pm last night.

This was shot from a tripod with a Canon EOS 5D Mark 2 at ISO 6400 and f/5.6 through a Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens with 2.0X teleconverter.

Hundreds of birds were moving very quickly into the top of the chimney as the final few moments of daylight rapidly faded away. This image is a layered composite of several shots of the birds, shot at shutter speeds varying from 1/60 to 1/8 sec as the light faded. That's why some of the birds show motion blur and some don't.

The Chimney Swifts will leave Houston and continue their journey South, about November 15.

-CGTTL

A Face Only A Mother Could Love

I wonder if this bird thinks my face is as ugly as I think his (or hers) is.

This was shot about half an hour before sunset in the gardens of a local restaurant in Houston.

It was shot from a tripod with a Canon EOS 5D Mark II in Av mode at f/8.0, 0.5 sec, and ISO 100 through an EF 70-200mm F/2.8L IS USM lens with a 2.0 teleconverter at an effective focal length of 255 mm.

Click on the image for a better look at that face.

-CGTTL

Swan Song - Flipped

Here's the same image I just posted, but I flipped it horizontally, so the bird is moving from left to right. In real life it was moving from right to left. Notice the signature is now backwards.

Which version do you prefer? Theoretically, It shouldn't matter, I suppose, but in this part of the world we're accustomed to things (...like words) moving from left to right. I prefer left to right, but that may just be my English-speaker's bias showing.

If this were photojournalism, we couldn't flip it. But since it's art, we're free to do anything we want.

Right?

-CGTTL

Swan Song

My wife and I had Sunday brunch at a restaurant in Houston today, and the view out the window included this wonderful swan. So I asked the manager if I could come back around twilight and photograph it. She agreed, and about half an hour before sunset I was back shooting this image.

This was shot from a tripod with a Canon EOS 5D Mark II at f/8.0, ISO 400, and 1/45 sec, cloudy white balance, in Av mode at -1.5 Ev, through a 70-200 mm f/2.8L IS USM set at 200 mm with a 2.0x teleconverter (effective focal length 400 mm).

Post processing in CS4: square crop, levels, curves, vibrance, selective unsharp mask, and a vignette. Oh, and I added my name at the bottom with a text layer with the opacity at about 20%.


-CGTTL

Sunken Gardens

This Photomatix Pro three-image HDR was shot in Butchart Gardens, near Victoria BC.

It was shot from a tripod with a Canon EOS 40D, set at f/8.0, 1/60 sec, and ISO 100, through a Canon EF-S 17-55 mm F/2.8 IS USM lens set at 17 mm (1.6 crop factor). Shooting in Av mode, AE bracketing was used at -2, 0, +2 Ev.

Post in CS4. I notice that significant sharpness and color vibrance were lost in flattening and converting this image from a PSD file to a small JPG file for the internet. Not sure what to do about that.

-CGTTL

Auto Motion

This was shot at ISO 100, f/8, and a 1/2 sec shutter speed from a tripod.

It may be fine art (...or not, depending on the eye of the beholder), except for the fact that it doen't meet the two major criteria I've decided determine what is and what isn't photographic fine art: 1. A square crop, and 2. A black and white conversion!

...of course an interesting subject may have something to do with it, as well. :-)

-CGTTL

Mecom Fountain Revisited

Here's another take on Mecom Fountain with the Zaza Hotel in the background.

-CGTTL

Waiting For The Train

I'm starting to get interested in images that imply motion. Let's see where it leads.

You may want to click on this image to see it a little larger.

-CGTTL

Mecom Fountain Revisited - Some More

Here's another try at improving the composition on the Mecom Fountain image I posted on August 26.

I re-shot it yesterday with very bright overcast skies in the early afternoon. It's a three-image HDR shot at 24 mm through a Singh-Ray Variable ND filter set at about 90% of maximum opacity.

I shot it at 24 mm with a full-frame sensor, so the original images had lots of wide-angle lens distortion. To get all the buildings standing up straight, I used Edit>Tranform>Skew and Edit>Transfrom>Scale in CS4 to get the vertical lines looking vertical.

I like this composition, but I'm about to decide using HDR and variable ND filters in combination is not my favorite look. Not in this kind of flat light, anyway. One or the other with a more interesting sky and a later or earlier time of day may be the ultimate answer.

Stay tuned.

-CGTTL