Official Photography Thread

[tooblue]

Sitting on my porch in an Adirondack chair, I just witnessed a battle between a Spider Wasp and an Orb Weaver spider. Both, roughly the same size, fought to a stalemate. The Orb Weaver heroically parried every thrust made by the hovering Wasp with its long fore legs. Eventually, the wasp gave up and flew away. It was amazing. Here's a pic of the tiny hero ... a strong breeze kicked up and he is frantically trying to repair his web. It's been a rough day:

[beefytee]

I took my mirrorless Panasonic Lumix up with us packbacking on the far side of Timp. We camped at Scout Falls.

I don't have a good enough telephoto lens to be doing nature shots. Mine is a 45-150mm lens. I just used the auto-setting to take all the pictures and touched them up a tiny bit, mostly making sure they are level.

Here was the scenery around our camp.

EastPanorama.jpg

SouthPanorama.jpg

NorthPanorama.jpg

We also ran into this gal and her calf as we were packing up and leaving.

MamaMoose.jpg

The calf wouldn't look our way.

CalfMoose.jpg

I certainly don't have the skills that others on here have and could use a better lens for these, but overall I'm happy with them.

[beefytee]

I also took a picture a picture with my Pixel 2 under one of the falls.

BehindScoutFalls.jpg

I wish I would have gotten the sunlight glistening off of the water, but with the mountains blocking the light most of the day I would have had to wait a few hours to get that.

[swampfrog]

I took my mirrorless Panasonic Lumix up with us packbacking on the far side of Timp. We camped at Scout Falls.

I don't have a good enough telephoto lens to be doing nature shots. Mine is a 45-150mm lens. I just used the auto-setting to take all the pictures and touched them up a tiny bit, mostly making sure they are level.

Here was the scenery around our camp.

[ATTACH]9726[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]9727[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]9728[/ATTACH]

We also ran into this gal and her calf as we were packing up and leaving.

[ATTACH]9729[/ATTACH]

The calf wouldn't look our way.

[ATTACH]9730[/ATTACH]

I certainly don't have the skills that others on here have and could use a better lens for these, but overall I'm happy with them.

The 3 landscapes are all good captures. One essential piece of post processing is understanding that light from the sky is much different than light reflected off terrestrial elements. Light has 3 components, intensity, direction, and color. On observing a scene directly, the human eye/brain system compensates for most of the differences, but when you look at a non-edited picture, the sky is often quite a bit brighter--or the ground quite a bit darker--than what one remembers. Learning to balance the above and below horizon elements in processing will add some realism back. In film days, graduated filters were used to manage this, but in the digital world it is often postponed for post capture.

The first image has lost much of the cloud detail, maybe irretrievably. The second is exactly what you want to capture, if there isn't anything of interest in the sky, then minimize it's inclusion. It simply needs some contrast and maybe some color balance. The third looks to have recoverable detail in the clouds and suffers from some haziness. Both of which can be adjusted.

The best lens for any given scenario is the one you have with you.

[beefytee]

The 3 landscapes are all good captures. One essential piece of post processing is understanding that light from the sky is much different than light reflected off terrestrial elements. Light has 3 components, intensity, direction, and color. On observing a scene directly, the human eye/brain system compensates for most of the differences, but when you look at a non-edited picture, the sky is often quite a bit brighter--or the ground quite a bit darker--than what one remembers. Learning to balance the above and below horizon elements in processing will add some realism back. In film days, graduated filters were used to manage this, but in the digital world it is often postponed for post capture.

The first image has lost much of the cloud detail, maybe irretrievably. The second is exactly what you want to capture, if there isn't anything of interest in the sky, then minimize it's inclusion. It simply needs some contrast and maybe some color balance. The third looks to have recoverable detail in the clouds and suffers from some haziness. Both of which can be adjusted.

The best lens for any given scenario is the one you have with you.

Thank you. That is very useful. I will see if I can touch up the sky separate from the rest of the photo and bring back the detail in the first photo.

I am using the lens as an excuse. I do wish I could have gotten a tighter shot on the moose. But then again, it is way better than I could have gotten than with just my phone. He would have been a small dot on a phone.

[Pelado]

The best lens for any given scenario is the one you have with you.

Sounds like sound advice.

[swampfrog]

Sounds like sound advice.

I wish I was the originator, but it's a common phrase.

[Bo Diddley]

I took my mirrorless Panasonic Lumix up with us packbacking on the far side of Timp. We camped at Scout Falls.

Nice pics. I love Timp.

[Copelius]

Bear River Bird Refuge.

[tooblue]

I shared more photos in the backpacking thread in The Gym forum, but here are some others from my 3-day canoe trip this past week:

[swampfrog]

the lily pads are very nice

[tooblue]

[PaloAltoCougar]

A couple of random photography-related items: Just for the heck of it, I'm in a two-day workshop at Stanford on iPhoneography (apparently that's a word) where I'm finally learning what one can do with the iPhone camera beyond pushing the button--it's amazing how much finishing software and other goodies are packed onto that device (I acknowledge I'm very late to the party here). One interesting tidbit--because of smartphones, more photos are taken during any two-minute period around the world than were taken during the first 100 years of photography.

And... with uncharacteristic spontaneity, I decided to take the missus on a cruise later month. It begins and ends in Rome where I've arranged for a professional photographer to take us around the major sites late at night (between 9 and 1) while he instructs my wife on how to get the best shots.

[swampfrog]

And... with uncharacteristic spontaneity, I decided to take the missus on a cruise later month. It begins and ends in Rome where I've arranged for a professional photographer to take us around the major sites late at night (between 9 and 1) while he instructs my wife on how to get the best shots.

That's the best way--someone knowledgeable about the subject and the science/art of photograph making--leading a tour/outing. Fastest way to learn I think. A Mediterranean cruise would be awesome.

[swampfrog]

I entered a local contest for photos taken within the confines of the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. 2nd place landscape category. Probably posted this photo in this thread somewhere.