I'm still here...

This is a quick blog entry...just a place holder...to say that I'm still here. I have been so swamped with work, family, and projects (and my Mom's upcoming 90th birthday party) that I have had virtually no time to get out for photography or process what I have managed to shoot. Someday soon though, I promise to get out to take more photos and to get around to updating this blog.

At long last, it is time to add another photo. I've been pretty swamped over the past few months, and when not preoccupied with work and family, I've been fixing things, clearing downed trees and taking care of everything that needs doing around my home.

I purchased a Canon 5D MKII a few weeks back, and finally today had a chance to actually use it for a short while. I took a trip to the Seattle Zoo for a few hours this afternoon, along with my family. Here is one of the first photos I took, converted to black & white. With my family along, I was fairly distracted, and really could not focus a lot of attention on photography, and we arrived fairly late in the day, so the light was not ideal.

This photo of a gorilla is an approximate 1/6 or 1/8 frame crop of an image taken with my 300mm f/2.8 lens using available light and an ISO of 3200, 1/160th sec exposure at f/2.8 (not a lot of light!). The photo is entirely hand held (no monopod/tripod), so perhaps not as sharp as possible. In fact, it illustrates one of the most amazing qualities of the 5D MK II, and that is the low noise characteristics of the new 21.1 megapixel sensor. In this black and white, I have used the NIK software DFine noise reduction tool (just using the default settings). Overall, I liked this photo, and this crop, as to me, it conveyed well the thoughtful nature of this large animal.

Rainier Rainier Trip

We took a trip to Mt. Rainier this Labor Day weekend, and remarkably, the mountain was hidden from view for all but a few moments on Saturday afternoon, as we traveled past Kautz Creek. On Sunday, we headed up to Comet Falls, about 2 miles and 1600 feet up from the main park road, and just before we arrived at the falls, it began pouring. So much for planning on 3 days of photography and "previsualizing" the shots I was to take!

Here is one photo of a waterfall above Narada Falls (just below where the road to Reflection Lake heads east and the road to Paradise continues northeast).

Narada Falls, Mt. Rainier National Park, Washington

This is a High Dynamic Range Image, necessitated by the sun on the top of the falls, and the darkness in the canyon below. The HDR exposures covered nearly 4 stops range.

Technical Details: Canon 5D, 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, B+W circular polarizer. Exposures were f/22 for 1/13 sec, f/22 for 1/6 sec, f/22 for 0.3 sec, f/22 for 0.6 sec.

Post processing included color balancing the shaded area (warming it), enhancing saturation, adjusting levels, and contrast.

August 23, 2008

Canon 5D, Canon 24mm TSE (both shifted and tilted on vertical axis), f/14, 0.5 sec, ISO200, 3-stop grad ND (Singh Ray).

Paradise Creek, Mazama Ridge, Mt. Rainier NP

This photo was taken on August 23, 2008 at Mt. Rainier National Park in Washington.

This is an image from the Paradise River, just below Mazama Ridge, Mt. Rainier National Park, in the Washington Cascades.Technical Details: Canon 5D, Canon 17-40mm f/4.0 at f/22, 1.0 sec, ISO 100, B+W circular polarizer to block reflections on the rocks.

NOTE: This is a "manipulated photo" in that the image was flipped horizontally to make the water flow from left to right. This does not exist in nature in this form.

First Light at Mazama Ridge, Mt. Rainier National Park

This photo was taken on August 23, 2008 at Mt. Rainier National Park in Washington.

This is from Mazama Ridge, just below the Paradise River. Technical Details: Canon 5D, Canon 24mm TSE f/14, 5.2 sec. ISO 100 with a Singh-Ray 3-stop grad ND (hard) to tone down the sky and mountain.

This was a late year for wildflowers in the Cascades, about 3 weeks after the normal bloom, and the bloom has been inconsistent, with the lupine a bit stunted. Several snow fields still crossed the trail, and the climb up to Mazama ridge, which we began around 5:15 AM was still pretty wet.