Working It in HDR – The Truck

Well I finally got out to do a little shooting this past weekend. The main subject I came across was an old dilapidated truck. Great subject for some nitty-gritty HDR images. While there were other vehicles, I choose to really work this vehicle. I have included three of the images here in the blog. As usual these have all been processed in Photomatix (grunge look) and processed further in Photoshop using Nik Software pluggins. The top blog image is a bit different in that it is composed of a multiply blend of a high structure BW image (ala SilvreEfx Pro) and the color image – gives it a real gritty look. Also note that I chose to break a rule and let the horizon line in the background be tilted. Keeping the background out of focus made this less of an issue so I could add the dynamic tilt to the truck.

Which one do you like best?

 

Know Your Camera Repair Person

You may look at the title and wonder if you are on the right photography blog, but you are. This blog is more on the business/relationship side of photography than the art side. Sooner or later if you are out shooting a lot you will have an “accident”. They hit when you least expect it. For example, last year I was done with a shoot one day walking on the shoulder of the road back to my vehicle and suddenly my feet started slipping on some loose gravel and down I went, camera, lens and tripod. While the tripod and camera got a couple scratches the lens took the brunt of it (and so did I). You get a wonderful sinking feeling about how much this is going to cost (after you get past the shock and pain). Time to visit the camera repair person.

This brings me to the title subject. Over the years I have been fortunate to find a good local camera repair shop. I have had them clean sensors, repair lenses and cameras, etc. They have always done good work, given me the repair options vs. cost and guaranteed their work for 1 year. But it wasn’t until yesterday that I realized one of their greatest values.

When picking up a lens from an inspection yesterday I had the opportunity to just talk and ask questions of the owner who had inspected the lens. The more I talked with him the more I began to realize the wealth of knowledge and skills he possessed after a couple of decades in his business. He knew details about lots of lens, compatibility issues, which were best, how they might fail and what it would cost – just good practical knowledge that  I usually look up on the internet. The big difference was that I could ask follow-up questions, get opinions on tradeoffs, etc. I also found out he offered services that I never even thought of but could have used (and will use).

In this age of the internet, it can be easy to overlook the wealth of knowledge and skills that might be next door. So take the time to talk with your local camera shop or repair shop owner. You might be surprised what you can find out.

If you don’t have a local repair shop let me recommend Advance Camera Repair, they do great work for reasonable cost and the service photographers all other the US.

Blog image: Just thought I would throw in another train image that I am submitting for a calendar. HDR double processed with the headlamp turned on courtesy of Nik Viveza.

Birds in Motion

I haven’t been able to get out and shoot lately so I decided I would share a couple images from another body of work I have been working on and will continue with in the coming year. They are a series of early morning light images of birds and water fowl in motion. They have been captured at relatively low shutter speeds (1/8 to 1/4 sec) and in some cases I have used an on camera flash set to rear curtain mode at full power. What does that mean? It means that flash doesn’t fire until the end of the time the shutter is open. This combined with loose panning creates a very interesting effect as you can see in the first blog image. Simple soft backgrounds are another common characteristic of these images. Note that it does need to be pre-sunrise light in order to shot at the slow shutter speeds and have any impact with a flash. Hope you like them.