A Little of This...

I wanted to do another blog post before the end of February and maybe get away from the trail scenic landscape genre and HDR processing a bit.

Here are some recent shots not like the recent blog posts. Shooting information is set forth in the captions.

The bird shots were made through a double pane window at a distance of about 6 feet so are a bit soft. The Northern Cardinal shot is not cropped at all and the female House Sparrow shot is cropped from 2x3 format to 3x4 just to eliminate unnecessary background.

The cat was shot in a back-lit bay window with natural light.

Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM at 70mm,  f/2.8,  1/180 sec., ISO  400

Canon EOS 1D Mark III,  EF 300mm f/4L IS USM,  f/4, 1/180 sec.,  ISO 400

Canon EOS 1D Mark III,  EF 300mm f/4L IS USM,  f/4, 1/250 sec.,  ISO 400

Black and White Trail Scenics

As the end for the Peebles Island Trail Scenic Project nears, I still need to fill in the time from now until the beginning of Spring.

The best time to hike the island remains the early morning when the trails are still frozen. There are spots with 5 inch deep boot prints and others with inches of water. But at 8 AM with the temperature in the 20's it's all hard and easy to navigate.

Today was a good day for black and white images as the light was low and even with some frozen mist in the air. All images were made with my EOS 1D Mark III and EF 17-40mm f/4L USM lens. All are three shot bracketed exposures and processed with Photomatix Essentials.

Only a Month To Go

I began the year long Peebles Island Trail Project last year on March 22nd, the beginning of Spring. The project will end when Winter does - just over a month from now.

I have a new project planned for Peebles Island which I'll start at that time. The trails on Peebles Island have been wet and muddy lately and early morning, while they're still frozen, is the best time to move around.

Here are four images from yesterday, all made with the EOS 5D Mark II and EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM lens at f/8 and ISO 200. As has become my usual practice for landscapes, all are three bracketed shots processed with Photomatix Essentials.

To HDR or not to HDR

I've become used to processing almost all my landscape images with HDR software rather than using a single exposure. One thing HDR processing can do is add texture to an otherwise boring sky.

While some people don't like the look of exaggerated HDR skies, I don't find it all that different from the result you'd get from using a polarizer filter.

A week ago I was out shooting on a very cold morning and decided to stop in at the old Cohoes Falls overlook downstream from the falls. We had just had a lot of rain and the Mohawk River was quite full.  After making a few shots of the falls, I walked a bit and turned my attention to the river below the falls.

Here are three shots from that perspective showing both a single, normally exposed image and the result of HDR processing using Photomatix Essentials' "painterly" settings. Bracketed exposures for the HDR processing were 1.5 stops under and over exposed.

Canon EOS 5DII, EF 17-40mm f/4L at 40mm, f/8, 1/500 sec., ISO 200

Canon EOS 5DII, EF 17-40mm f/4L at 17mm, f/8, 1/500 sec., ISO 200

Canon EOS 5DII, EF 17-40mm f/4L at 40mm, f/8, 1/500 sec., ISO 200

End of January

The end of January seemed more like March. Thursday night the 30th into the 31st set a record breaking temperature of 56 degrees along with 6 tenths of an inch of rain. All of the snow and most of the river ice from the preceding frigid weeks disappeared.

The trails on Peebles Island were an inch or so of mud on top of a frozen base. As is typical, I got to observe a pair of adult Bald Eagles as a walked around the island with a 17-40mm lens. But, the purpose was to add to January's trail scenics not shoot birds.

Again, the EOS 1D mark III and EF 17-40mm f/4L lens was a nice weather sealed pair for the wet weather, the 10 frames per second of the 1D making quick work of the 3 frame bracketing for HDR processing. Here are three shots, all at f/5.6 and ISO 400.