Pink Flowers - D700, Lensbaby, Topaz & Fractalius
Here’s two more from my nursery walk-about yesterday. The pink flowers were using the Lensbaby Composer with the soft focus optic, finished off in PS with Nik Color Efex 3.0, Topaz Adjust 4 and the fractalius filter. Just a little of each, nothing over the top.
Purple Tipped White Begonia - D700, Lensbaby Composer
This purple tipped white begonia was shot with the soft focus optic too and finished off in PS with Nik Color Efex 3.0.
Texture Blend Birds
Mid winter has passed and it’s time to do some image experimenting. I have seen some great posts recently by Tony Sweet and John Barclay on their blogs doing some texture blending. Looked real interesting sooooo I thought I’d give it a shot. Now that I’ve done some experimenting I will have to keep this in mind when I’m out shooting, trying to visualize some final images.
Texture Blend Leaves
A while ago I shot some photos (HDR) for a local business to use on one of their trucks. It was an interesting and challenging space to photograph, a large empty converted ribbon mill. Driving through town today I saw some of the images on one or their trucks. Good thing I had my G10 in the glove box so I could get a few shots of the finished product.
Ribbon Mill Truck, Image 1 - G10
Ribbon Mill Truck, Image 2 - G10
I know, not the greatest product shots you’ve seen lately but at least it shows the end use, sort of. Not the images I would have used from the session but then again it’s NOT my business or truck. Here is the large pano I shot, the image I would have used…
Ribbon Mill Pano - D700, 24-70mm - Click to view larger
This is a 8 shot HDR pano, 4 bracketed (2 stop ev) for each piece of the pano. That’s a total of 32 images taken for the final panorama.
Here are the two images they used for the truck before the cropping was done, these are 4 shot (2 stop ev ) HDR images. So the final image blow up was enlarged/pushed about as far as you might want to go…sometimes you just don’t have any control on a project and it doesn’t quite end up the way you might have liked.
Ribbon Mill 1 - Click to view larger
Ribbon Mill 4 - Click to view larger
Longwood Christmas Lights - D700
Since we are getting REAL close to Christmas I dug into the photo archives and found these two images from a trip to Longwood last year. There was a light rain and it gave all the lights a little extra glow, also kept the crowds down. These were both hand held shots and required a fair amount of post processing to get the feeling I wanted.
Longwood Christmas Lights Inside - D700
Romeo Dreaming of Sparrows & Bushy Squirrels
This is one of our cats, Romeo, sleeping in one of his favorite spots. A basket by the window and a splash of warm sun would send me into dream-land if I was a cat. I’m pretty sure he is dreaming of sparrows and bushy squirrels because that’s one of his favorite activities at the windows and doors when he’s awake…
Kitchen Sink - Lensbaby Fisheye Optic
Just got my Lensbaby Fisheye Optic delivered today by UPS and took it for a spin around the house…I think I’m going to enjoy shooting with it. Opens up a whole different way to look at things. Added some Topaz Detail to both images.
These are just some quick shots from around the house to see how the optic works. I plan on shooting lots more real soon…
Doorway - Lensbaby Fisheye Optic
Cottage Window, Crail, Color - D700, 24-70mm
This is the kitchen window at our friends home in Crail, if you think you see a pair of eyes in the window, you’re right. It’s one of the family cats, the BLACK one of course. Processed this with Topaz Simplify and Topaz Detail. Also added the edge effect with Nik Color Efex Pro, Vignette filter. For all you black and white fans, here’s a version using Nik Silver Effects Pro. I can’t decide which one I like best?
Post Updated: As requested by Betsy, I have added a soft focus effect to this image. I didn’t add a lot of softness to the image because it won’t show very well in this small version. Also just for Betsy a enlarged detail of the window with the cat…
Cottage Window, Crail - Softer Version
Cottage Window, Crail - Enlarged Detail
Cottage Window, Crail, B+W - D700, 24-70mm
Crail Oceanview - D700, 24-70mm
This is one of the beaches in Crail, Scotland. It was a pretty windy day as you can see by the choppy water. Right along the beach down by the water was a playground with swing and slides. Could by great for the kids in nice weather but on this day you might get blown into the water. No one was at the playground that day…
Cockburn Street, Edinburgh - D700, 24-70mm
Here’s an architectural shot from the streets of Edinburgh, Cockburn Street. I liked all the different turrets, texture and the shadows of the building across the street creating a shadowed skyline. Processed this with Topaz Adjust and Topaz Simplify, finished off in Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 with Paper Toner.
Harry Potter Bridge, Sepia - D700, 24-70mm
Here’s another take on the Harry Potter Bridge on the Road to the Isles. Used a slide sandwich effect for a softer look in CS3 and finished off with Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0, Paper Toner…
The Verandah Restaurant - D700, 24-70mm
We stayed at the Atholl Palace Hotel in Pitlochry. The view from the restaurant (The Verandah) was quite spectacular. Shot this one morning after breakfast, the light was calling to me. Processed this using Topaz Simplify to get a painterly feel to the image.
Harry Potter Bridge - D700, 24-70mm
This was shot on the Road to the Isles. It’s the bridge you see in the Harry Potter films. Also processed this using Topaz Simplify, seemed to work for this image too… See below for a slightly larger blow up of part of this image. Really need to see this large for the full effect.
Harry Potter Bridge - Detail