1/10/2011: running away icy

I think this will be my last pic taken in 2010. Tomorrow we will move into the new year! This is Emmon’s Preserve again, in Kennebunkport Maine, with the little Baston Brook (river?) running down over ledges away from us. It was a difficult shot to frame as there was no clear line of site.

This is the wider view, which I also quite like, despite its busy foreground.

If you compare the two you will see that I had to clone out the little branch tip in the first shot.

Canon SX20IS at 85mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/125 @ ISO 80, Snow Mode, and at 28mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/250 @ ISO 80, Snow Mode.

Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity (see page link above).

1/9/2011: If dancing water froze

Happy Sunday!

I suppose there is no real surprise here…other than the fact that it is possible. This is what even the most rapidly flowing, swirling, jumping water coming down a little series of falls in Maine looks like when it freezes. It captures the motion in solid form. It turns the music of the rapids into intricate folds and fingers of ice. How? I will admit, I can not quite imagine it.

But then I don’t really need an explanation. It is enough to find it there on my walk…to see it for what it is…and to bring it home to share with you…to bear witness.

It is an instance of truth that must be seen to be believed, and that, once seen, is sufficient to itself.

It is Sunday, and you might be ahead of me with where this image is leading me. Because, of course, what I see and appreciate in this image shares an identity with what I see and most appreciate in the spirit. The essence of faith is that it is possible even when we can’t imagine how…but it is also truth apprehended, seen, touched, felt, experienced…that is sufficient to itself, beyond the need for explanations. Like dancing water frozen and yet in still in motion, truth is something we must experience, and that we can only bear witness to. With no spiritual camera to bring back the evidence to share, I have no choice but to become the dancing water, to let the frozen motion form within me, to let truth perceived shape my life into a living witness.

In that sense, what matters here is the taking of the image, and its sharing, not so much the image itself.

Canon SX20IS at 560mm equivalent, f5.7 @ 1/200th @ ISO 200. Snow Mode.

Processed for clarity and intensity in Lightroom.

1/7/2010: Icy Kiss!

Take one more look at the image before you read all about the difficulties of making it.

A little curl of water and lacy ice surrounded by snow, and an all but impossible exposure problem. I decided to let the snow go completely white, in order to bring some light and life to the flowing water and some texture to the ice. I tried it both ways. This is one of those cases where I over-ruled the built in Snow Mode using Exposure Compensation.  Unfortunately, the snow goes gray very quickly, if you decrease exposure, and the water goes too dark. All in all I prefer this standard Snow Mode treatment. The tight crop, is, of course, to emphasize the pattern of ice and water.

This is what it looks like pulled back a bit.

You can see from the dappled light patterns that the adjacent snow happened to be in sun patches on both sides. 

Canon SX20IS at 290mm equivalent, f5 @ 1/80th @ ISO 200. Snow Mode.

Wide shot at 70mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/160 @ ISO 80, also Snow Mode.

Ah yes…but that is just technique…the image either stands as it is, or it does not.

Works for me. 🙂

1/6/2011: Baston Brook Buried

Emmon’s Preserve fills a bow in Baston Brook (river?) where the stream descends over rock ledges on its final run to the sea. The little falls, swirling rapids, and quiet pools there have given me a lot of entertainment over the years.

When I hiked in the other day after our December blizzard, I don’t know exactly what I expected, but it was certainly not to find the stream all but buried in snow.

For contrast, here is a very similar view from last March.

I was standing slightly further to the right in the top shot, simply because I did not know, after the blizzard, where land stopped and water began under the drifts, and I was not about to find out the hard way.

Today’s shot, Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/250th @ ISO 80. Snow Mode. March shot much the same but 1/125th and Landscape Mode.

Both processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity.

12/23/2010: Snow on the Marsh 2

Another shot from my snowy morning walk. You might recognize this unnamed creek from previous views, in other seasons. Here the tide is at flood, the marsh is lightly snowed, and we even have some floating ice. It is the leaves in the water in the foreground that adds a dimension for me. You can see the streaks of the close snow that was still falling, and the white dots in the air further out.

Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. f3.5 @ 1/60th @ ISO 80. Landscape mode.

Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity. This shot took more than usual fill light to bring up the green in the trees.

And, in the spirit of experimentation, here is a B&W treatment, using the green filter effect in Lightroom. I quite like, for this kind of shot at least, what the green filter does for B&W.

12/12/2010: Wide-eyed

Happy Sunday!

I went out yesterday morning, while waiting for my new laptop to arrive, looking for some images…without a lot of hope. It is the nothing season, long this year, between fall foliage and snow. The trees are bare. Even the oak leaves are down. The grasses are brown. The air is cold. There is a sense of waiting: waiting for something to happen to move the season along.

And yet, there were things of interest out there. The light on this little patch of frozen marsh, and the texture of the frost. The contrasts of white birch and evergreen. The hint of red in the brush on the left.Delicate, but, I think, beautiful.

And, of course, the lesson here is that every season has its beauty…if you have the eyes to see it. One of my favorite scriptures is Luke 11:34, here from the Message Bible: Your eye is a lamp, lighting up your whole body. If you live wide-eyed in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light.”

And that is my ambition. To live wide-eyed in wonder and belief. To fill up with light. And that’s a good Sunday thought, and enough to go on with any day.

Canon SX20IS @ 45mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/320 @ ISO 80. Landscape mode.

Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. 

 

10/20/2010: duck brook bridge, Acadia np

The bridges of Acadia National Park were built by John D. Rockefeller Jr. to employ master stone masons out of work due to the depression. They are, real works of art…but none are easy to photograph, and Duck Brook Bridge, which spans a deep little ravine, is particularly hard. Finding an effective vantage point is particularly difficult, especially among the trees. This shot catches some of the interesting features of the bridge, and puts it in is natural context…this is a view anyone who visits could see. The leading rail of the fence was an experiment that I think works, and between exposure and Lightroom processing I managed to preserve a relatively natural and balanced look. A slight crop from the bottom was applied to eliminate the more severely out of focus rail, and to improve composition.

Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/400th @ ISO 80. Landscape program.

Recovery for the sky in Lightroom. Some Fill Light for the foreground. Blackpoint right for intensity. Added Clarity and a bit of Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.

And a second view.

10/11/2010: color on the Mousam

Happy Columbus Day! In New England, Columbus day weekend is celebrated primarily by motel and restaurant owners, as the height of the short, but profitable, leaf peeping season. I am, of course, still in Georgia, though I am headed home today.

This is a week ago, right across the road from Old Falls Pond of yesterday’s post. This is the Mousam River above Old Falls, framed at the medium-tel end of the zoom on the Canon to catch a pocket of color and the reflections in the surface of the moving water. Sometimes less is more…or at least as much.

Here is the full scene.

Both shots are three exposure HDRs using autobracket shifted –2/3 EV on the Canon SX20IS. Exposures were blended and tone-mapped in Photomatix, and processed in Lightroom for using Fill Light, Blackpoint, Clarity and touch of Vibrance, and, of course, Sharpen narrow edges. One advantage of the HDR method, if you like the effect, is the automatic blurring of moving water, even at higher shutter speeds. The three different exposures catch the water, as in the falls here, in three slightly different positions and Photomatix, though it does a really good job of blending exposures, does produce some blur for the overlapping motion. A rapidly moving surf line, for instance, or foreground vegetation moving in a strong wind, is death to HDR. Here it actually, I think, adds to effectiveness of the image.

So I am looking forward to seeing what the foliage is like in Maine the day after Columbus Day…

9/18/2010: No Name Creek HDR

I have taken several shots this year from this spot, where a little creek with no name flows under the old railroad embankment (now the Kennebunk Bridle Trail) on its way to the Mousam River and the sea, generally tempted by a sky like this one. This is a Canon SX20IS and Photomatix HDR, using the auto bracket feature on the Canon for three shots.

The wind was blowing very hard and you can see the disturbance in the grasses of the marsh, but the creek bed is deep enough so that the water, at least back against the sand, is still enough to reflect.

Three shots, separated by 3 EV, auto bracket, with the center point moved down 2/3rd EV using the Exposure Compensation dial. Canon SX20IS @ 28mm equivalent. ISO 160.

Blended in Photomatix using tone mapping and detail enhancement. Final adjustments for Blackpoint, Clarity, Vibrance, and Sharpen in Lightroom.

8/10/2010

Marsh Light

Another shot from my Saturday outing, and another Canon SX20IS and Photomatix HDR. Two shots.

Just a very quiet domestic scene with a touch of wild in the marsh in the foreground, and some drama in the clouds. Or so I hope. The tension between the elements is of interest to me.

From a technical standpoint, the trick was to take both shots with no cars visible on the busy road that passes between the house and barn…and of course I was trying to do this handheld. A tripod would make HDR much easier…but then I’d have to carry the tripod.  

Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. 1) 1250th @ f7.1 @ ISO 80, 2) 1/400th @ f4 @ ISO 80. Exposure compensation dial used to change the exposure by eye for the clouds and landscape.

In Photomatix, enhanced detail, tone mapping blend, with the settings tweaked by eye for the desired result. I am still very much learning to use Photomatix.

In Lightroom, a touch of Fill Light and Blackpoint to the right, added Clarity and Vibrance and Sharpen narrow edges preset. Cropped at the top to constrain the sky.

From Around Home 2010.