HDR Photography

I placed an order for a set of neutral density filters a couple of weeks back. Since I shoot lots of beach scenes, I've been trying to get smooth flowing water as it washes over the beach. That's hard to do when you're photographing with too much sunlight. Even if you make the aperture as small as it can possibly be, you'd be lucky enough to get 1/50 of a second shutter speed. And that's not slow enough to get that silky smooth flowing water effect. ND filters will allow you to get this effect. This is because ND filters are designed to drop your exposure down by one, two and even three stops, allowing you to shoot at slower shutter speeds. This photo was the first set of tests and the ND filters did exactly what they were designed to do. I wasn't planning on posting this test photo but then I added some textures and suddenly this photo became worthy of Captain Kimo's signature :)

Seven Falls is a 181ft waterfall that cascades down in seven distinctive steps. Frozen waterfalls aren't nearly as interesting as the flowing ones. This was the most snow I saw during my entire Colorado trip. Climbing the stairs to get this shot was exhausting. It might not look like much with this photo, but factor in the cold weather, thin air and steep incline and you got yourself one hell of a workout. And this was only the halfway point! There is a total of 224 steps to reach the peak and this was the first set. I'm not the type to quite halfway so I proceeded to finish the treacherous stairway from hell. Was it worth it? Not one bit. But now I can at least say I did it. As I'm sure most of you shutterbugs have done similar things in seek of the perfect shot.

Imagine waking up to this view of the Rocky Mountains every morning. Better yet, imagine a long day at work then relaxing here with a cold beer! Not to rub it in, but I had a chance to experience both :). My visit to Colorado was a pleasant one. Unfortunately there wasn't much snow. Just white patches of ice where the Sun couldn't reach. I went there hoping to photograph an ice storm. But I think I would have had better luck in Florida. And I mean this literally, cause after I left Florida a cold snap hit that froze the entire state. It seems my traveling luck is just too good.

Enough of about the trip, let's talk about this photo. This was taken with 4 exposures. The first 3 exposures was shot without me. I mainly focused on capturing the landscape and surrounding environment for HDR. The fourth exposure was focused on me using a flash for fill light. I merged the first 3 exposures using Photomatix. Then I layered the fourth exposure on top of the merged HDR image in Photoshop. I masked everything out in the fourth exposure but me. This is the technique I've been using to shoot my self portraits and it's been working well. However I'm not happy with how the lens distorted my body in this image. But I am happy with the overall results.

HDR image photographed on Singer Island beach during a sunrise shoot with a local photography group. I was considering not going that morning because I knew just by looking outside the sunrise was going to be terrible. But I went anyways, more to socialize with the local shutterbugs than to shoot. I was right though, the sun never showed. Not with that giant cloud covering the entire horizon. It's frustrating waking up early to shoot a sunrise only to never see the sun break the horizon. However light did manage to escape through the haze and color the sky for about 30 minutes. Which was enough for me to get this shot.

It's cool to see how other people see. That's one of the reasons why I attach the original exposures to all of my photo posts. We all have different taste and when it comes to art we all see beauty differently.

These are a couple of edits that K.G.Photos has done with my photos.
Mouse over the image to view my original edit.

The last time I was at the South Florida Fair was back in high school. How time flies! I would have never guessed back then that I would end up here as a photographer. But here I am, shooting photos with a local photography group. I really wanted to make this image fun. So I pushed the limits of my processing technique. Almost to the point where it becomes an illustration. In most cases heavy processing really detracts from the image but in this case I believe it works well. However I'm not to happy with the results from the sky. It's very blotchy because of the clouds. I could Photoshop it out but I'm not sure if this composition is worth all that time. What do you think?

My second self portrait processed in HDR using a 4 exposure technique I developed recently. HDR of people can be tricky, if the subject moves even slightly, an undesirable ghosting effect occurs. Also when tonemapping multiple exposures of a person, the results are far from pleasant. A friend of mine calls this the muddy look, and he nailed it. No one wants to look dirty, unless it's for Halloween. This new 4 exposure technique combines the stunning look of HDR but keeps people from looking nasty. I'll post a full article on this technique soon, once it's perfected. Until then let me know what you think, is it too much or not enough?

During my flight home from Colorado I had a layover at George Bush International Airport in Houston, Texas. The Continental airplane landed in Houston just as the sun began to set. As luck would have it my next gate was facing west with a clear view of the setting sun. This gave me an opportunity to photograph my next plane preparing for departure to Florida. Not a bad shot considering I had to shoot through a dirty airport window with reflections galore. My trick to avoiding greasy finger prints and unwanted reflection is to place the lens directly against a clean area of the the window. This will reduce reflection from the glass and give you a clean shot without any nasty figure prints. Stability is also added when the lens is place firmly against the window, and since I shoot HDR, I need all the stability I can get. I try to avoid pulling out my tripod in the middle of the airport nowadays. Folks tend to give me the evil eye when I do.

Found this train while driving around the neighborhood in Fountain, Colorado. You're probably wondering how I managed to capture such a sharp image without any motion blur. The secret... find a train that's not moving :-).  I couldn't have been any more lucky, this train stopped at the perfect position. In the background is the Rocky Mountains and the snow cap peak is Pikes Peak. Pikes Peak, is the most visited mountain in North America and the 2nd most visited mountain in the world behind Japan's Mount Fuji. I'm currently still in Colorado, and I have only one word for this place, "breathtaking," and I literally mean breathtaking. Being from Florida, the altitude in Colorado has rendered me useless as a photographer. It's been a struggle hiking around the mountains with my camera gear. The air here is very thin and the zero degree weather is not helping either.