My online journal where I share my interests in photography, nature, coffee life, journaling, fountain pens, bicycling, spirituality and asking deep questions.
Last Wednesday morning I drove out to Peralta Trail Road for morning sunrise. Man there is something about being out in the desert before sunrise. On this cold January morning, 27 degrees, it was so quiet and peaceful. Most of the creatures of the desert were huddle up somewhere staying warm. Very few birds out so no morning songs. Just quiet. Ever notice there are more stars in the desert. 🙂
I’m off on another trip this morning. See ya in four days.
I was one of those photographers who carried two GND filters, a one stop and a two stop. A year or two ago I removed them from the bag and started bracketing certain scenes for HDR images, even though I did not own any HDR software nor did I know what the technology would evolve into. I also did know how well it would be acceptable by myself or others. The only cost to shooting more images would be a small amount of my time and disc space. So, why not.
Just as any software there is a learning curve involved. We all go through the steps. I mumble to myself a question like: What happens when I do this? I watch the image form on the screen then mutter something close to “Yuko!” I then quickly hit command “Z” and try something else. I’m quickly noticing how important it is to expose them correctly. A good series of images will make a good final image.
The scene above was taken while visiting my parents in January of 2010. I took a total of seven images, bracketed at one stop each. This scene is created with three exposures, one at metered, the second at plus one stop and the third at minus one stop, and using one of the presets in Nik HDR Efex. I settled on the Nik HDR Effex software over Photomatix because it was more intuitive for me. Only time will tell if I made a sound decision.
For as long as man has kept records a sunset is always followed by a sunrise. This image was taken near the same location as the sunset image from yesterday, only looking east.
Taken along the Peralta Road near Gold Canyon, AZ. I am just below the Superstition Mountains looking west out over the city of Phoenix.
This was taken back in January while I was down in Arizona visiting my parents. The two morning I was there I made sure I got in some sunrise photos and with a goal in mind. One of my goals for this coming year is to experiment with HDR. So I made sure while I was in Arizona to take a few bracketed images of the sunrises in order to experiment with the software. I’ve now downloaded a 30 day trial to see if I would like it. So far I’ve not been satisfied with my results and decided to just post a single image of what I experienced on one of the mornings.
I will be missing in action for a few days as I travel to Arizona for a visit with my parents. Want to celebrate my dads 81st birthday with them. I’m not taking my laptop but will have my camera. I also plan on soaking up a bit of sunshine.
While visiting my parents in Gold Canyon AZ, I decided to rise early and drive out to Peralta Road on the south side of the Superstition Mountains for some sunrise shots. I was given more than just a sunrise as I discovered this owl perched on a saguaro. I believe it is a Great Horned Owl and is probably searching for one more morsel before finding a cool place to spend the day. There is something special about being there just before sunrise.