A Chapel Hill Landmark
August 14, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
One of the tips that Scott Bourne gives is in his Going Pro podcast is to try to market your photography to your local market. I guess it’s should not be surprising then that, as a North Carolina resident, I have sold more copies of my Old Well picture than any other of my images. I took some other shots of the Old Well that day, but my HDR technique at the time was lacking. I didn’t take dark enough exposures to get all the detail in the sky. Also, if I really wanted to make this image stronger, I would process it with software that has better anti-ghosting than the version of Photomatix. The Photomatix 4 Aperture plugin & new Nik Software HDR product cannot come soon enough.
If You Build It
August 12, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
I’ve driven by this particular construction site a bunch. It’s fairly amazing to see how quickly they cleared out this lightly forested field, and turned it into this mass of red dirt and clay. I’ve always meant to stop and take a few pictures once all the workers have cleared out, but I really didn’t want to end up covered in red dirt. Last night I made a special trip, including wearing shoes I figured would get destroyed. I ended up getting some pretty good photos….but my red mud covered shoes are now in the dumpster.
The Sky is on Fire
August 10, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
Last night was one of those nights where I went out to take a certain picture (which I did end up getting, though I’m not as blown away by it as I thought I would be) but ended up getting a whole bunch of other photos to go through. I use Nik plugins on almost all of my images, but sometimes I forget that I have the full suite of Topaz Labs plugins as well. One plugin that gives some particularly interesting results is Topaz Simplify. It allows you to give a painterly look to your photos. I used it to create the image of the Old Well that now hangs above my television and also used it on this photo. I was interested to see what would happen with the red sky contrasted against the green foliage in the foreground and I ended up really liking the result.
Storm is Brewing
August 8, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
I need to work on fixing ghosting more in HDR images (especially in the trees), however, in this case, I wouldn’t have done anything with the clouds anyway…maybe a little touch-up work if I was going to print this photo, but I like the motion of clouds in HDR, especially in black & white.
I wonder if Photomatix 4 (which I still don’t believe has an Aperture plug-in for its beta) or Nik’s new HDR offering (whenever it’s released in “late summer”) will be able to handle selective ghosting correction
Where’s my Fountain?
August 6, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
I was watching a Nik Software webinar today that was put on by Lesa Snider. She was discussing how to prepare images for iStockphoto and, even though I’m not a stock photographer, some of her trips were pretty interesting. One of the tips I particularly liked was how to use the “Ink” filter inside of Color Efex Pro to make a photo look faded and “old timey” (technical term). I think I have one or two photos from my walk around the Brier Creek golf course that the effect will good on, but I was looking for another photo to give it a shot on first. I decided to use this pano I took of the gazebo / fountain location that I photograph fairly often. Sadly, the water in the lake is fairly low and the fountain was not going when I took my picture.
From a technical perspective, this photo was stitched together using Photoshop. Additionally, I’m starting to experiment more with brushing in highlight / shadow adjustments instead of doing global versions of them. I think this allows me to bring out some areas (in this case, the trees and bushes bordering the lake on the side I’m standing) without effecting other areas (the sky looked a little funky when I did a global shadows adjustment).
Hitting the Back
August 4, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
Taking a break from writing a couple of different things for the site. Here’s a look from the tee box on 10 at Brier Creek just before the sun goes down.
The End of the The Tell
July 31, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
Last night was the last performance of local Chapel Hill band The Tell. Though the band got together in the middle of 2005, I only started going to their shows in the past coupe of years (when I started being in classes with the drummer). I admit that when I first heard them (via a CD from said class member) I wasn’t exactly pumped to see them live. I decided I’d be a good classmate and support them anyway. Over the past few years, I’ve changed my opinion on them, and a few of their songs now reside comfortably in some of the playlists on my iPhone.
Regardless of my initial opinion about their musical style, I won’t offer anything but praise for their talent. From lead singer to drummer to keyboardist to the guys on the guitar, these guys can flat out play. The Chapel Hill music scene will be worse off with The Tell no longer playing.
Normally these Snapshot posts only feature one image, but I’m making an exception this time. This photo comes from the last song of the night, the last song for The Tell:
Night and Day
July 30, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
With Brier Creek golf course closed, I had a few ideas for shots that I wanted to take in different parts of the course. I ended up running into a couple of problems though, including some storm clouds blocking the sun and me bumping up against the technological limitations of my Nikon P6000. So what am I to do with a bunch of shots taken for HDRs that don’t quite come together correctly? I decided to try tand do some “concept” images. This one is an experiment where I tried to get both the silhouette of the trees, in almost pure black, against the clouds in the sky, while keeping the green and the sand traps lit. In other words, I wanted to see if I could get the picture to look like I actually lit the green at dusk.
I’m not quite sure I managed to get that look without the picture looking too over proceed, but it was a good experiment for working with Photomatix, Aperture sliders (black point especially), and Aperture brushes (especially a shadows adjustment). Even if this image isn’t something that I’ll put in my portfolio, I hope the skills I used to create it help me become a better photographer.
Going off One
July 27, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
I arrived at Brier Creek yesterday, figuring I’d take a light walk just to get out of the house for a bit. I went past the first hole and saw a sign that said “Course Closed”. Man, if I had known that, I would have showed up much, much earlier in order to photograph some things. Sadly, I got there pretty much right at sundown and only got a few shots. This is from the first tee.
Walking by the Wall
July 25, 2010 by Kivus · View Comments
Yesterday was the 3rd Annual Scott Kelby’s Worldwide Photowalk. I attended the walk in Cary, NC, an area that I was not at all familiar with. I’m not sure if I got any one picture that really blows me away, but I got a bunch that I do really like. I’m sure I’ll be posting some in the next few days, along with my final submission for the contest associated with the photowalk and a general write-up about the walk itself. Quick Summary: It was a really, really good time. The photo here is from one of the many painted walls around Cary.
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