Bell Mountain HDR

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, HDR composite

My first-ever solo backpacking trip was to the top of Bell Mountain, the second highest point in Missouri. My campsite provided a particularly good view of the sunrise, so I decided to get a picture of myself watching the day start.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a single shot that was properly exposed for the sky, the ground and me all at once. Fortunately, I brought along a small, lightweight tripod that allowed me to shoot a series of pictures at different exposure levels, including one in which I sat on a rock and triggered the shutter using a remote.

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 1/2, f/2.8, ISO 100

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 1/2, f/2.8, ISO 100, taken a little later

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 1.3 sec., f/2.8, ISO 100

Then when I got back home I used Photoshop’s High Dynamic Range option to combine the three pictures. As I was in only one of them, I copied myself from the original photo and pasted myself into the HDR combo, making a few adjustments to make me match the rest of the image.

As is common with HDR-generated images, the result isn’t precisely faithful to how the world actually looked at the time. Normally I’m not fond of the “are you just high all the time?” look, but here it works for me. The sunrise looks somewhat like the first seconds of a hydrogen bomb detonating, which for some reason strikes me as so out of keeping with the moment that it seems paradoxically appropriate.

Penguins and lights

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 8 sec., f/8, ISO 100, adjusted

Last Sunday the family did the annual lights tour, driving around the city after dark and looking at some of the more elaborate displays. One of our traditional stops is Pauly’s Penguin Playground, a wonderful riot of inflatable, mostly penguin-related decorations. For some time now I’ve wanted good pictures of this spot, but in the past I haven’t brought the right equipment.

I’ve been reluctant to drag a tripod into the middle of everyone’s holiday fun, but without some kind of brace it wasn’t really possible to leave the shutter open long enough to get a proper exposure. The compromise: the monopod with its three-pronged base extended. It was still a bit more jiggly than I wanted, but it helped a little to use a remote rather than the on-camera switch.

They didn’t all come out perfect, but I was pleased with some of the results.

After that we mostly stayed in the car and drove around, which of course made it hard to shoot the long exposures required by low light conditions. However, I thought I’d have a little fun at one spot. The result can’t accurately be called a realistic depiction of the scene, but it’s kinda pretty.

D7000, 10.5mm, 8 sec., f/8, ISO 100, adjusted

O Christmas Tree

Nikon D7000, 18mm (18-55), 20 sec., f/6.3, ISO 100, adjusted

Faithful fans of the blog may recall that a couple of years ago I posted a fancy time exposure of our Christmas tree. This year we changed the decorating scheme a bit. But as before, a low ISO kept the colors true and long shutter speeds brought the lights out (harder this time because the new bulbs are smaller).

I shot the lead-off picture shortly after I put the tree up and got the lights on it. And then overnight it snowed, giving me another good photo op in the wee hours of the morning.

Nikon D7000, 24mm (18-55), 25 sec., f/11, ISO 100

Waterfall

Nikon D7000, 44mm (18-55), 3 sec., f/29, ISO 100, on-camera filter, adjusted and cropped

Yesterday was the final in-class session of my fall Photography course. As usual, the last non-online meet was optional, and as nobody who showed up needed to get caught up on anything, we spent the time having some fun.

The main activity was a set of light painting experiments I’ll post next week. But after class I was still in a picture-taking mood so I decided to try a new filter I bought awhile back.

The main idea behind neutral density filters (other than protection for expensive lenses) is to reduce the amount of light getting into the camera without affecting the color or image quality. The new toy in this case was a Hoya 52mm 3-400 variable density filter.

Variable density filters can be adjusted to let in more or less light. The minimum setting for this one lets in 1/3 of the light that would otherwise get through the lens, the approximate equivalent of 1.5 stops. At the opposite end of the scale the filter screens down to 1/400 of the light, around nine stops.

The photo at the top of this post shows the filter near maximum strength. The ISO is down as far as it would go and the aperture closed up as tight as it would go. The result is not much light getting through and not much sensitivity to record what does get through. That’s how I got away with a three second exposure, which otherwise in bright sunlight would have over-exposed the shot so badly that I would have gotten nothing but an empty white frame.

At this speed the water (the only moving subject in the shot) turns into a hazy blur. Compare the long exposure to something closer to normal speeds:

Nikon D7000, 44mm (18-55), 1/125, f/5.6, ISO 100, on-camera filter, adjusted

Turning the filter down to its minimum allowed me to speed up the shutter and freeze the flowing water. Though the result is a great deal more “realistic” (i.e. more like what you’d perceive if you were actually looking at the scene), it’s arguably not as interesting to look at. The composition is  more chaotic, not as smooth as the longer exposure that records the general flow rather than individual drops.

Stars

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 30 sec., f/2.8, ISO 800

The whole time we were in New Mexico, I kept hoping for the chance to photograph the night sky. We were staying in Dixon, a small town far enough from city lights to allow me to get a good shot of some stars.

So naturally it was monsoon season. Every single day the sky clouded up late in the afternoon and stayed overcast until well after I’d gone to bed.

But on our second-to-last night there, I finally got some luck. The skies cleared almost entirely (you can still see some clouds toward the bottom of the shot) and I finally got the shot I was after.

I set up a tripod in the courtyard of the mission where we were staying and took the picture with a wide angle lens. So you can see roofs, trees, a pole and some power lines. The light in the window in the lower left-hand side is from my wife’s phone. A 30 second exposure will pick up just about any available light.

Exile in the rain

D3000, 10.5mm, 0.3 sec, f/8, ISO 200, adjusted

Around a month ago I got a rare confluence of events: a rainy night and the free time to go out in it and shoot some pictures. I promised Amy I’d photograph the neon at Exile Tattoos some damp evening, so this seemed like the perfect time.

Naturally I brought a tripod along so I could work in the dim light. I started with the 10.5mm lens, taking a few shots in the lobby (below) before moving outside for the pictures I came to get (above).

D3000, 10.5mm, 0.5 sec, f/8, ISO 200

The outdoor photos I took with the 18-55mm zoom didn’t turn out as well. While I remembered to bring the camera’s raincoat, I neglected to bring one for myself. Thus I ended up drenched before I got anything I was happy with.

On the other hand, it wasn’t raining indoors. So while I had the camera on the tripod, I decided to play around with a special effects trick: zooming with the shutter open. The technique produces a strange, streaky effect that draws attention to the center of the shot. I’d tried the trick a few times in the past, but this is the first time I got genuinely interesting results:

D7000, 18-55mm, 2.5 sec, f/13, ISO 100

Wells Overlook again

Nikon D3000, 10.5mm, 1/400, f/10, ISO 800

Though we were a little early for good fall colors (especially with the lingering summer heat and dry weather), a Saturday in late October proved to be our best opportunity to return to Wells Overlook to shoot some more pictures. This time I brought more equipment, including a tripod and a range of lenses.

My favorite of the set was a 10.5mm shot taken from the KU side of the tower (see above). I’m especially fond of what happens to the horizon when it’s positioned at the curving edge of the fisheye frame.

At the opposite end of the focal length spectrum, here’s a 500mm shot of the south side of KU’s main campus more than four miles away.

Nikon D7000, 500mm (150-500mm), 1/80, f/16, ISO 100, adjusted

Even with level adjustment in Photoshop, the colors end up somewhat washed out by the dust in the air (courtesy a stiff breeze and of course the distance from the subject).

Also note how flattened the perspective becomes at this focal length. It’s hard to judge the vertical distance between objects. Are the buildings in the foreground right next door to the dorms, or are they blocks away? That smokestack that looks like it’s part of the left edge of McCollum Hall is actually more than a mile behind it.

And to round things out at the end, here’s a view of the overlook tower taken from the bend in the road visible in the first shot:

Nikon D3000, 10.5mm, 1/800, f/14, ISO 800, cropped

Soccer

Nikon D7000, 150mm (150-500), 1/800, f/9, ISO 400, cropped

As long as I have the State Fair series disrupted for sports, I might as well post some soccer shots. The afternoon was baking hot when I shot these from the sidelines of KCKCC’s home opener, so if I get too far into October before posting them I fear they’ll be badly out of season.

The picture at the top of this post is sports photography with all the elements in place. Details are clear. Framing is good. Motion is frozen. Body posture and facial expression tell a dramatic story.

Of course it’s easy to set up a shot like this when you know pretty much precisely what’s going to happen, where it’s going to happen and when it’s going to happen. Because sports such as soccer are generally more free flowing, you have to stay loose (frequently adjusting zoom and focus), look for good moments and shoot lots of pictures.

Here’s an example of a good moment captured without a lot of careful set-up:

Nikon D7000, 150mm (150-500), 1/800, f/7.1, ISO 400, cropped

For all their fun, sports tend to be serious business. However, every once in awhile you can catch some humor:

Nikon D7000, 400mm (150-500), 1/125, f/9, ISO 100, cropped

The main subject in this shot was doing some warm-up jumps, but his body posture and the apparent “reactions” to it come across as funny.

And of course a warning: when photographing sports, shutter speed is absolutely crucial. Compare the kick and head shots above with this picture taken earlier in the afternoon:

Nikon D7000, 150mm (150-500), 1/125, f/10, ISO 100, cropped

The difference in shutter speed is a small fraction of a second, but what a difference it makes in motion blur and the story you tell with your picture.

I should also mention that this week we added the very first actual instructional slide show to The Photographer’s Sketchbook web site. It’s an introduction to sketching color.

Pinhole

Nikon D7000, Lensbaby Scout with pinhole optic, 6 sec., ISO 100, retouched

Inspired by an exhibit of Ruth Thorne-Thomsen’s photography at the Nelson, I decided to drag out the pinhole optic for my Lensbaby Scout and experiment with it.

When I first got the optic, I found myself frustrated with the lack of control it entailed. It’s difficult if not impossible to precisely aim a pinhole, so that wasn’t what I was used to at all. I also found the images fuzzy. Uniformly fuzzy, an aperture that small eliminating depth of field pretty much entirely, but fuzzy nonetheless.

After looking at the photos in the exhibit, I was comforted to learn that the fuzziness wasn’t something I was doing wrong. And the aiming issue was nowhere near as big a trick for me and my digital camera (where I could instantly check the results) as it would be for a film photographer or even an artist using light-sensitive paper (as Thorne-Thomsen did).

However, when I opened an experimental shot in Photoshop to adjust the light levels a bit, I noticed something interesting. The picture was speckled with dozens of tiny ghost images of the pinhole. I’d never encountered this before, but I’m assuming the effect is similar to what you’d get with a creative aperture. Click on the image to blow it up for a better look.

Nikon D7000, Lensbaby Scout with pinhole optic, 6 sec., ISO 100, retouched, enlarged

Snowpocalypse

Nikon D7000, 29mm (18-55), 1/3 sec., f/10, ISO 100

So last week it snowed. And snowed. And snowed. Classes were cancelled for two days, leaving me with plenty of photo time on my hands.

The picture above was taken from a spot near the location of last week’s night shot. Having learned my lesson about snowflakes on the lens, I used a hood this time. As in previous efforts, the long exposure necessary to capture the light causes the falling snow to turn into more of a mist in the photo.

Nikon D7000, 48mm (18-55), 1/160, f/6.3, ISO 200

Didn’t take long for the snow to get deep. Here the big, ploppy flakes show up well against dark objects in the background.

Nikon D7000, 30mm (18-55), 1/60, f/4.5, ISO 560

We were doing quite a bit of business at the bird feeder. This picture is less of a planned photograph and more of a quick snapshot through a window with the camera’s settings on auto. Still, I like the way it turned out. I’m particularly fond of the birds caught in mid-flight around the feeder.

Nikon D7000, 55mm (18-55), 1/50, f/36, ISO 100

I love the tiny points of light that shine in the middle of a smooth patch of snow. Even at dawn the sunlight was already quite bright, so I closed the aperture down as far as it would go and worked with a slower shutter speed to bring out the light points.

Nikon D7000, 35mm (18-55), 3 sec., f/8, 100 ISO, retouched

And then Snowpocalypse Two hit less than a week later. Here’s another early morning shot taken with a long shutter speed and a hood to keep the snow off the lens. I also retouched it in Photoshop to make it slightly less orange.

Nikon D7000, 32mm (18-55), 3 sec., f/8, 100 ISO

Just for fun, I decided to add a flash to the long exposure. The objects in the background are too far away for the flash to reach them, but the falling snowflakes closer to the camera bounce it back nicely. The blue color is a result of the camera trying to white balance for the flash. Though I hadn’t anticipated it, I like the effect.

Night snow

Nikon D7000, 28mm (Tamron 28-200), 3 sec., f/8, ISO 100

Snow wasn’t in the forecast, but there it was nonetheless. Although it started at the end of a long day, I thought I’d venture forth briefly and get some shots anyway. This picture is the best of the set, and you can see the detail better if you click on it to enlarge it.

If I’d had more time and energy, I would have dug out the camera’s raincoat and installed the lens hood in order to keep the snowflakes off the lens. As it was, however, the blurring from the melting flakes produced an interesting effect with the lights. I was especially fond of the contrast between the fuzzy geometry of the droplets and the clarity of the unobscured parts of the image (such as the tree branches to the left).

The light streaks are from a van that passed through the shot while the shutter was open. With a three second exposure, the dimly-lit van doesn’t stay in any one place long enough to show up in the photo. But its lights are bright enough to leave trails, even when reflected on the slick pavement. The dashed lines were produced by the van’s turn signals.

Happy holidays

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 3 sec., f/8, ISO 100

Starting next Monday The Photographer’s Sketchbook will feature our eight favorite previously-unblogged photos of 2012. I actually finished the entries a couple of days ago, scheduled them to run and then put the blog to bed for the rest of the year.

Then the snow hit. Though it was really exceptionally cold outside, I did venture out to the deck to set the tree aright and shoot a few pictures. This one was the best. A low ISO and a three second exposure (thank you, tripod!) allowed me to bring out the dramatic oranges in the sky, a good contrast to the bright blue lights.

And because I can’t seem to shut the teaching thing off (even when I’m on break), here are a couple of other approaches to the same subject.

Nikon D7000, 18mm (18-55), 2 sec., f/8, ISO 100

The exposure here gives me a similar sense of light and color. Indeed, I love the strong blues (which is why I got blue lights for the tree to begin with). On the other hand, the shot composition isn’t quite as good. I also miss the dramatic sky.

Nikon D7000, 10.5mm, 1/4, f/8, ISO 100, Vivitar flash at 1/16 strength

The only differences between this flash-heavy shot and the available light picture at the top are the shutter speed and obviously the flash. At only 1/16 of full strength, the flash creates a nice effect; any stronger and the tree probably would have turned into a blob of bright white haze. I also like the snowflakes frozen in midair. Still, if this was The Shot from this set, I’d be strongly tempted to edit out the bird feeder.

RoboRoach

Nikon D7000, 55mm (18-55), 1/2, f/13, ISO 100, cropped

Once a semester I like to devote a class period to useless photo techniques. To be sure, these tricks have their uses. But in Intro to Photography I put a premium on pictures that capture perceptions. For me, saving a moment in time is the ultimate photographic experience. Elaborate set-ups and “fake” photos don’t do as much for me. Thus I don’t generally use techniques that require a lot of prep work.

Still, some of them are fun to play with. This semester I decided to try one I’d never done before: rear curtain flash. This technique combines a long exposure with a flash to create a double exposure without actually exposing the frame twice.

To get this effect, start by slowing the shutter way down (I’m using a half second exposure here), which of course requires a tripod. A rapidly-moving object such as this small robot – dubbed RoboRoach by one of my students – will move a lot in half a second, resulting in a photo that looks like this:

Nikon D7000, 55mm (18-55), 1/2, f/13, ISO 100, cropped

In order to get the subject itself to actually show up, I need a shorter exposure as well. Normally that means a short shutter speed, but here that isn’t an option. However, I can fake it by firing the flash right at the end of the exposure. In the photo at the top of this entry, you see the extreme motion blur of the half second shutter combined with a flash that lasts for a fraction of a second at the end of the shot. The flash freezes RoboRoach, combining the clear, frozen shot with the blurry “vapor trail” of light reflected from the shiny spots.

The trick is to fire the flash at the very end of the shot, which is called “rear curtain flash.” Normally cameras fire the flash at the front end of the exposure, based on the assumption that what you want is what you’re looking at exactly when you press the shutter button, not at the end of the exposure. In truth, most flash photography is done at higher shutter speeds (use 125 as a default), so the “curtain” doesn’t matter much.

But to create this effect, I want the streaky blur to trail out behind RoboRoach. If the flash fires at the start of the shot, the vapor trail will extend out in front of the subject. Thus I need a camera with a Rear Curtain Flash setting, which my D7000 just happens to have.

Fireworks

Nikon D7000, 10mm, f/10, shutter 5 sec., ISO 200

I took this photo last week during the annual Fourth of July fireworks festivities. It has several things to teach us.

First, fireworks need to be facing up when you light them. We got three launchers lit at once, and you can see two of the three performing as designed in the middle of the photo. Unfortunately, the third one ended up sideways, spinning itself around as it shot flaming, exploding balls all over the neighborhood. You can see the light trail left by one that’s going off just out of the shot on in the lower right. In the middle right you can see one flaming under a truck in the driveway across the street. In the middle left you can see a big one in the street. And at the far left you can see one detonating in the bushes. That last one is also a lesson in the importance of raking the dead leaves out of your hedges, as it started a brush fire that took a few minutes to put out.

In the photography realm, the key teaching point is the importance of being in the right place at the right time with your camera ready. If my camera had been in a bag in the house, I wouldn’t have gotten the shot. Even if I’d been a little earlier or a little later with the shutter, the picture wouldn’t have documented the event as completely.

At least to an extent, photos like this are a matter of luck. But we can influence our luck greatly by taking steps to improve our odds. In class I nag students constantly about keeping their cameras with them at all times and getting into the habit of taking a ton of photos. Moments like this are the payoff for the practice.

You can also see some technical elements at work here. Normally shooting in extremely dim light with a low ISO would produce a big, black square. But the light from fireworks produces a strong lighting source. In this example, the loose pyrotechnics are sort of like having someone running around the shot firing a strong flash left and right. Because fireworks were the target of the shoot, I locked the camera down on a tripod and set the shutter for five seconds. This extremely slow shutter speed also allowed me to catch some more standard shots of explosions that went off in the sky like they were supposed to.

And for the more advanced photographer, I also followed some advice from Nikon’s newsletter and turned on the long exposure noise reduction setting.

Nikon D7000, 10mm, f/10, shutter 5 sec., ISO 200