Picture of the Day

**Lonnie** · 08-20-2010, 09:14 PM

**TNKen** · 08-20-2010, 09:38 PM

Found this little gal earlier this summer and have watched her grow. Lives in an evergreen by the back deck.

Learning about the macro function. Still a long way to go.

**Wiilbert** · 08-20-2010, 10:46 PM

Between Lonnie and chainsaw willie on the last page, I'm not so sure I should post these...

C&C appreciated. Will remove the blurry stick from the foreground in #2 next time.

**mtcham** · 08-21-2010, 12:59 AM

I see these guys eyeing the gophers everyday on the way to work, seems like they are less and less spooky.

**Tuckerman** · 08-21-2010, 06:25 AM

Originally Posted by outabounds

My 2 cents on waterfall shooting:

Put the camera on a tripod, use manual or shutter priority and the lowest ISO you have. Take your first shot at 1/8 sec and keep shooting with progressively slower shutter speeds until you get up to several seconds. Compare the results. I like faster moving water blurred somewhere around 1/3 sec best. It keeps more detail that way.

Wide angle (zoomed out) tends to look best. Get the camera as close to the water surface as you can without dunking it. Try to include some foreground detail like rocks in the stream.

Thanks man

**Lonnie** · 08-21-2010, 08:50 AM

Originally Posted by Wiilbert

Between Lonnie and chainsaw willie on the last page, I'm not so sure I should post these...

C&C appreciated. Will remove the blurry stick from the foreground in #2 next time.

I like 'em. I'd like them more with a little more saturation and a little more contrast (read blacker blacks)...

**mtcham** · 08-21-2010, 11:11 AM

Nice shots Wilbert. I really like the first one. Did you try different angles on the second one? I'm no expert on these kinds of shots but a slightly faster shutter speed on the second one might give a little less blur on the drop.

**SchralphMacchio** · 08-21-2010, 11:46 AM

Hey Wilbert I like em. Did you have a circular polarizer on at all? This sounds really trivial but for whatever reason the veiling reflection in the bottom right is more distracting than the stick you wanted to remove (in fact the blurry stick is kind of nice, blurry things in foreground can give your frame context and depth). It's because the transition from the shadow is so contrasted that even though the reflection is not too glarey it's still distracting, and I don't know if it was worse and you put on a CP to minimize or if a CP would totally cut it out. Something to play around with.

**outabounds** · 08-21-2010, 01:24 PM

Originally Posted by Wiilbert

Between Lonnie and chainsaw willie on the last page, I'm not so sure I should post these...

C&C appreciated. Will remove the blurry stick from the foreground in #2 next time.

I think four seconds (the shutter speed in #1) is better suited to slow water. This water is moving pretty fast, so you can expose it for under a second to get good blur while retaining some interesting detail within the blurred water. Good job getting something in the foreground.

I always shoot this kind of thing with a range on shutter speeds (from about 1/8 through a couple seconds) and pick the one that works best for me later.

edit:
I agree with the CPL comment above. Great filter for water. I like to be able to include the cool looking stones in the creek bottom and the CPL can give you that.

**Chainsaw_Willie** · 08-21-2010, 02:48 PM

Originally Posted by Wiilbert

Between Lonnie and chainsaw willie on the last page, I'm not so sure I should post these...

C&C appreciated. Will remove the blurry stick from the foreground in #2 next time.

My pics are constantly outclassed by all the other, better photogs around here. Don't be afraid to post just because others might have something you think is better.

I like your two shots but agree with comments already made about #2 - a little more contrast and saturation would be good as well as trying a little slower shutter and a CPL. Looks like you were shooting on a cloudy day and it's hard to get good contrast and color in those conditions.

**Wiilbert** · 08-21-2010, 04:53 PM

Thanks for the input all. I did shoot with a CPL, it's brand new and these are part of the first 20 shots I've ever taken with any sort of filter. I had a couple hot french chicks waiting for me, so I didn't have time to play around as much as I'd liked with the filter and various angles. I'll try to get back there in the next few days.

I'll play with faster shutter speeds next time. The biggest issue I'm having is trying to keep from blowing the water and still get some detail in the shadows. Here are the 2 unedited shots for reference.

Lonnie, interesting to hear you ask for more saturation. I felt I was on the verge of overdoing #1, but I see what you mean with #2.

Here are the raws if anybody is bored and wouldn't mind showing a photo jong what's possible. Always good to be reminded of how great this place is. Thanks all.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6720244/_DSC0221.ARW

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6720244/_DSC0226.ARW

**Fuzz** · 08-21-2010, 05:06 PM

Trying to "see" shots in unlikely/boring places. These are from a trip to Dallas this past week...

**mtcham** · 08-21-2010, 05:25 PM

I was bored
Wilbert, I took the liberty of tweaking a few things with your second shot for my own practice. The water is still blown out a bit.

Edit: worked on the water some more

**Gebster** · 08-22-2010, 01:32 AM

My first time photographing the Milky Way from Mammoth Lakes during the recent August New Moon

**JimLad** · 08-22-2010, 07:38 AM

Are you stacking images to do that? I just got a cable release and want to do some night photography but my initial attempts have not been great.

**wra** · 08-22-2010, 09:57 AM

Goats on Timp

**Gebster** · 08-22-2010, 11:46 AM

Originally Posted by JimLad

Are you stacking images to do that? I just got a cable release and want to do some night photography but my initial attempts have not been great.

It's just one photo with a 30 second exposure. I guess I need to learn about stacking

**Tap** · 08-22-2010, 12:14 PM

**outabounds** · 08-22-2010, 03:33 PM

Originally Posted by JimLad

Are you stacking images to do that? I just got a cable release and want to do some night photography but my initial attempts have not been great.

To capture the faint lights of the Mily Way you'll want a large aperture and/or high ISO. Stacking is used more often for star trails.

**Fuzz** · 08-22-2010, 03:56 PM

Originally Posted by outabounds

To capture the faint lights of the Mily Way you'll want a large aperture and/or high ISO. Stacking is used more often for star trails.

While your first statement is correct, the second one is not. Stacking is absolutely used for faint objects. Almost without exception, all astro-images use stacking, and all night sky images can benefit from stacking.

This a single 60-sec frame of Andromeda:

This a stack of 200 of those 60-sec frames:

This is a single 2-min frame of the Milky Way:

This is a stack of 10 of those 2-min frames:

Notwithstanding the trees moving through the bottom of the last image, stacking will always improve night sky shots by adding more detail and reducing noise (noise = square root of total signal, so the more frames you add, the higher your signal-to-noise ratio).

For very easy stacking, try DeepSkyStacker -- it's a free software that aligns and stacks all images automatically (you can also add darks, flats, and offsets for calibration if you have them).

**truth** · 08-22-2010, 04:28 PM

Very cool stuff Fuzz. Very cool indeed.

**smmokan** · 08-22-2010, 04:43 PM

My wife is puppy sitting for our neighbors, so I decided to take some pictures in the backyard this morning.

**Gebster** · 08-22-2010, 07:58 PM

The other night there was finally a really clear night in coastal San Diego that coincided with a bright moon. This has a been a very rare occurrence this summer along the coast so I took advantage of the opportunity and ran down to the coast by "downtown" La Jolla to take some long exposure "daytime at night" photos.