I'm still surprised by the detail in this photo, taken (and sent to the blog) with my new iPhone.
It's a shot of the sunroof in my Jeep from yesterday's rain, as well as my new background. The new HDR function on the phone is pretty sweet, so I'll definitely be playing with it a lot, not to mention the HD video!
A friend of mine from high school is now the membership director at the Portland Golf Club. They needed photos for marketing materials, so of course a photos-for-golf trade was all I needed!
The lighting wasn’t perfect, but we still had fun. If anything, we scouted spots for next time. HDR brought out some locations better than others:
Tonight Holly had her friend Kathy come over to help sew things for the wedding. Thus, I boogied outside and shot some more photos. Let’s just say the other day got me all excited to get out as much as I can nowadays, especially with the killer sunsets we’ve been having.
Here’s how I killed a few hours tonight down at the Sunset Transit Station where the Max Rail drives by:
I think it’s funny to look back at the “Edits” folder of my computer. That’s where I keep any photo I shot that I took a few extra minutes to make sure it looked good enough to share. Since it’s organized by date, it’s very easy to notice the trends I’ve gone through in just the past year.
You can tell just by stepping back and looking at the bunch as a whole where I first learned about Vibrance/Saturation in Photoshop CS4, as well as when I took the saturations to extremes. Then there was the heavy editing thanks to automated actions you could download from all over the web, followed by the heavy vignettes. There’s lots of panoramics and night shots, as well. Eventually came the HDRs followed by the use of Topaz Adjust to bring out single images into HDR-like fashions; not to mention long exposures, fast exposures and time-lapses.
Now, I’m into letterbox-style black borders. Why? I have no idea, aside from the fact that I’ve seen a few photographers (see here, here and here). Maybe it’s how they turn into a square. Perhaps it’s the contrast. Like I said before, I have no idea – I just like it.
…at least for now. We’ll see what happens next month.
Anyway, I’ve been busy playing with some older photos and taking some new ones this week and last. Here’s what I’ve been up to:
This little dandy was hiding deep in one of my Coeur d’Alene folders. Shots like this make me miss my drive to work in Idaho, all along Coeur d’Alene Lake Drive.
This was at sunset tonight. Holy friggin’ moly it was insane! I didn’t think I’d get it to look nice at all, and especially since I didn’t have my tripod handy. But I guess I was wrong…
I have wanted to shoot this photo since first moving to Portland, especially after seeing some awesome images of this same vantage all over flickr. Tonight was my night! This is actually an HDR of three separate 15-second exposures (+1, 0, –1).
From the same spot as above, overlooking downtown Portland from the top of OHSU. I had never been up here before until tonight, and I can’t wait to go back again! (Looks WAY better large!)
New edit of an old shot: This was from back when John came to visit. A little too dark for my taste, but I think that’s probably why I kind of like it, it’s not my normal edit.
And lastly, one of my favorite shots ever with an updated edit. This is probably my best “journalistic” shot, as I was on a police ride-a-long for a page design I thought might look nice. I borrowed a Canon from school and rode with a cop (who I actually went to middle school with, oddly enough).
A few weeks back I met my good friend Heidi downtown for pizza and beer at Rocco’s (more about that place in a bit). Nevertheless, since I had the afternoon off work and didn’t want to wait indoors for our meetup, I headed downtown an hour early with camera in tow.
Now, I’ve seen this elephant before, lastly when my buddy John visited over Thanksgiving, and we simply took a few shots with our Smart Phones. But this time I had my Canon S5, so I grabbed an HDR:
I’m fairly certain that this might be my greatest HDR capture yet. Especially with the blue skies and white clouds behind, thanks to Photomatix for helping me pop the colors and contrast (Of course, I cannot wait for Photoshop CS5, check out the new HDR file handling it boasts. Can I get a Boom Shakka Lakka?).
Here are the rest of the shots I captured while waiting. All in all I’d say arriving early was worth the wait!
On Wednesday I was going to drive out to Cannon Beach for some photos and spend the afternoon with Holly. Well, 
unbeknownst to me, she already had plans – so, I was going to go alone. But after thinking about it, I really didn’t want to. Besides, the coast was supposed to get rainy in the evening and I wanted a sunset photo anyway.
Instead, I waited a few hours until close to twilight and drove up to the Crown Point Vista House, roughly a 30 minute drive from our house. Now, the only reason I even knew about this building and the subsequent stellar view was from this photo on Flickr, taken by one of my new favorite photographers, Andrew Curtis.
I wanted to capture something similar, but alas, the cloud cover would not allow it. Rather, I was able to capture these three little beauties:
I never thought I’d be able to get the clouds look so nice during a sunset. After seeing this guy’s shots of the sunset at Fenway Park in Boston, I really had the itch for it. So, obviously an HDR was the only way to go and I’m fairly happy with my results.
A nice little 15-second exposure of the building and moving clouds. The moon was peeking through at moments, but my favorite part of this photo is the red light on the security camera screen. It’s easier to see when viewed large. You can also see some stars poking through in the larger version.
This is actually three images merged together. Since I was so close to the building I couldn’t get the entire window set and moon in the frame. I really like the cloud movement in this, but I’m not so sure about the way the building is slightly rotated in the frame. I was on my hands and knees in a parking lot with cars driving close behind, so I didn’t have much safe time to experiment.
I keep seeing awesome photos on Flickr that were shot around Portland. This only inspires me. It’s gotten to the point that I think about taking pictures more than anything else. When I grab my baseball gear for Little League practice I contemplate bringing my camera “just in case.” Just in case of what? I have no idea.
Anyway, here is some of the stuff I’ve been up to lately:
Click here to view this larger (it looks much better big). I went down to the waterfront again last night after seeing some sweet shots online. It had been a while since I shot a pano, let alone a waterfront photo of Portland.
I had driven up to the Pittock Mansion to test out some new settings on my camera one night. When I walked back to the empty parking lot after a heavy fog rolled in, I was greeted with this. The back lights of the Jeep flashed a few times because I pressed the unlock button on my key.
This didn’t come out the way I wanted. I will go back soon.
There wasn’t a cloud in the sky this day! I’ve been meaning to get down to the waterfront so I can snap a nice evening photo with lots of clouds flying around, but this was a pleasant surprise. It was so incredibly blue and clear I was just as happy.
I shot this on the way back to my car after shooting the one just above it. It’s hard to see, but there are cars flying by the freeway bridges in the background (as well as the busy road to the left of me as I shot this).
Yet another waterfront photo. This huge yellow tree has always intrigued me, but this attempt didn’t come out as nice as I had hoped.
With all that’s going on around me lately it seems that this blog has been at the very back of my mind (unlike this time last year, when it was indeed at the forefront of everything I did). However, I’ve been busy with work, trying to more work, bouncing between Coeur d’Alene and Portland to visit my grandpa, not to mention preparing for the upcoming Little League season (more on that later).
Nevertheless, I definitely have been taking photos.
With my newfound obsession inside the wide world of Flickr, I’ve been following other local photographers religiously. It’s especially intriguing to me how others shoot the same landmarks, as their perspective is often times quite different than my own. Long story short: I love my camera again.
As for my recent stuff, I’ve leaned pretty heavy on the HDR and processing in Photomatix and Photoshop CS4 with Topaz Adjust. I think I’m going to try and back off the Topaz Adjust a little bit, however, and maybe try the HDR a little less. I know it looks pretty sweet sometimes, but more often than not the photos just look fake. Even some of the amazing photographers I’ve seen sometimes overdo the HDR. But maybe I’m wrong. Who knows. I don’t really care, as long as the picture looks good.
Lately, though, I’ve finally started exploring parts of Portland I’ve only seen through Flickr. Photographers like Aaron Reed, Andrew Curtis and Zeb Andrews have chronicled some of the best Portland imagery, and it’s by following their Flickr Photostreams that I see where the best views can be attained. I’ve learned a great deal about my camera and how to use it better by attempting to imitate some of their shots before looking for my own.
Anyway, here’s what I’ve been up to lately. Seems I’ve got a love affair with Portland-area bridges:
Underneath the on-ramps an off-ramps of the Fremont Bridge.
Mt. Hood behind downtown Portland.
Looking up from the ground at the bottom of the St. Johns Bridge.
Silhouette of the St. Johns Bridge at sunset.
From the hillside at the south end of the St. Johns Bridge. In case you can’t tell, I love this bridge!
Fremont Bridge just after sunset. I think it looks fake because the sky turned out so incredibly blue. Oh well, what can you do? Not a cloud in the sky…
There is a technique among photographers that turns high-contrasting scenes into seamless masterpieces. It’s called High Dynamic Range, or HDR for short. Here is a simple breakdown of what happens:
Let’s say that you want to take a picture of a cityscape next to the river. What’s more, you want to do this in very low light. You want the lights on the building to show perfect, the water to reflect perfect and the sky to come out perfect as well. Unfortunately, most cameras simply aren’t capable of creating such an image. Either the highlights get washed out when the shadows are perfect or vice versa.
That’s where HDR comes in handy.
If you are creating an HDR image, you are going to take separate photos at different exposures before merging them all together. One photo will be underexposed, one perfect while another may be overexposed. When you merge the three together in a program like Photoshop or Photomatix, the best parts of each photo show up in the end.
And that is what I did this morning. When I woke up at 6 a.m. for reasons unbeknownst to me, I couldn’t fall back asleep. So I decided to be productive. I had seen many phenomenal photos on Flickr taken from the same spot down on the river. I tried to mimic them the other night, but to no avail. (Here is my favorite photo on Flickr of this scene).
Instead, I got an overall dark image. Here is my first version from the other night:
I got down there a little later than I had planned, but still gave it a whack. You can’t even see the pilings in the dark, and I even tried using my flash. No dice.
So, this morning, as I laid awake in bed thinking of how to be productive at 6 a.m. in the morning (without waking Holly, of course!), I decided to get the same photo as the sun came up. That way I could get the best light possible.
I was stoked when I got down there just before it got real bright out. I figured an HDR would be the best way to get all the elements I wanted, so I took dozens of the same exact shot. When I loaded them up in Photoshop CS4 afterward, they just didn't impress me.
But then I remembered a friend who always talked up Photomatix, so I downloaded that to see what I could do.
Voila!
I think I am love. I went back and ran another image through Photomatix instead of Photoshop, and I loved the results! Here is the HDR image that I shot this morning. Without a doubt, I have to say this is probably the greatest photo I’ve ever made – and it’s all thanks to HDR:
View it larger on my Fickr page here.
Funny thing happened around 3:30 a.m. this morning: I woke up. I was ready to get up. I was ready to for the continental breakfast in the hotel’s lobby and stoked for this journalism conference in Austin.
But it was 3:30 a.m. So I went back to bed.
Even though yesterday was exhausting (I hate flying anymore), I woke up again at 5:30 a.m. after a combined nine hours of sleep the previous two days, and I was up for good. A shower and a short shave later (I’m keeping the beard until I go back to Oregon), I decided to take some photos of the capitol building down the street.
My buddy told me about a program better than Photoshop when it comes to HDR merging, so I decided to try that – but then my tripod broke. So I tried my best, and only came out with one decent shot. I haven’t downloaded Photomatrix yet, but I plan to later today and play with these photos some more.
Anyway, here’s the one shot:
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