Stuff
I have been extremely lucky with the weather during my time in Phoenix with some nice sunrises and lots of cloudy mornings. I have stayed in most afternoons to nap and do my exercises. This morning took the cake … Read more below.
My physical therapist had a cancellation an hour after my 2:30pm appointment and invited me to stay for a double header. So I did. At this point I am not sure if I will have time to go out on Friday morning …
Thanks to all who left comments on yesterday’s boring in the fog hen image. I liked it too.
The Streak
Today makes one hundred sixty-five days in a row with a new educational blog post! This one took about an hour to prepare including the time spent optimizing the image. With all of my upcoming free time (or not …), the plan right now is to break the current record streak of 480 … Good health and good internet connections and my continuing insanity willing.
Booking.Com
Booking.Com came through for me twice again recently with both the DeSoto Fall IPT and next July’s UK Puffins, Gannets, and Bempton Pre-trip room reservations. And all the rates were great. If you’d like to give Booking.Com a shot, click here and you will earn a $25 reward. Thanks to the many who have already tried and used this great service.
Gear Questions and Advice
Too many folks attending BAA IPTs and dozens of folks whom I see in the field, and on BPN, are–out of ignorance–using the wrong gear especially when it comes to tripods and more especially, tripod heads… Please know that I am always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. Those questions might deal with systems, camera bodies, accessories, and/or lens choices and decisions.
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This image was created on morning of Thursday, January 11 at the Gilbert Water Ranch in Phoenix, AZ. I used the Induro GIT304L Grand Series 3 Stealth Carbon Fiber Tripod/Mongoose M3.6-mounted Canon EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM lens, the Canon Extender EF 1.4X III, and the blazingly fast Canon EOS-1D X Mark II. ISO 320. Evaluative metering at zero: 1/6400 sec. at f/10. K 6000 at 8:03am shooting into backlit ground fog, aka, fire in the mist. LensAlign/FocusTune micro-adjustment: -3. Center AF point/AI Servo/Expand/rear button AF on the avocet and release. Click here to see the last version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see the spectacular larger version. American Coot taking off with avocet and assorted waterfowl |
A Perfect Dramatic Fire in the Mist Image. Made With Lots Of Skill, Vision, and Creativity. And Even More Luck! …
As I seriously screwed up the text that was here originally when cutting and pasting some text for another blog post, you will need to get by with the short version.
It was cold with lots of dew on the car as I left for Gilbert in the dark. I figured that there might be some ground fog on the pond I had been photographing at. I was right, and when the sun rose it was fire in the mist once again. The luck here was that I had rear button focused on the avocet and released. When something scared the coots I fired off two frames and in today’s featured image, the main subject flew itself into perfect focus!
Help Support the Blog
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Please Remember to use my Affiliate Links and to Visit the New BAA Online Store 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the New BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod head, Wimberley lens plates, Delkin flash cards and accessories, and LensCoat stuff.
As always, we sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And please remember that I am always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail.
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Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right :).
Sheer genius. You have just elevated the American coot to levels it never thought it would see. Nice optimization. Great idea to start with. I thought, like Jake, that somewhere in btwn is better, but I’ve been back and forth several times today and I really prefer the bight oranges and yellows. Keep it up.
Thanks Ed. That is a good realization 🙂
with love, artie
This is a rare art Guru and I love it.
Thank you Quazi for your kind words. I like it a lot too 🙂
with love, artie
I like your post work Artie. You made it look like it looked in real life. Perfect! That’s the goal!
Your eye dropper was on the splash made by the landing bird. Who cares if a couple splashes are blown out.
Good stuff, Tony. Many thanks. See my response to Jake below
with love, a
Love the optimized image, just curious as to the thought process of having the ISO at 320?
I knew I was getting close to maxing out the shutter speed and I did not want a smaller aperture so there was only one thing left to do 🙂
Thanks Stephen.
with love, artie
Been wondering what optical “value” is represented in DPP sliders. Brightness I assume is F stops but what about shadow and highlight?
Somehow I don’t fully enjoy viewing this photo, although mentally I understand it’s excellent, quite unusual and unique.
Jack
Thanks for commenting JDW. No clue as to the answer to your DPP question …
with love, arite
“Brightness” is like “Exposure” in Adobe Lightroom. The DPP4 Shadows and highlights sliders are further down on the screen which is why you don’t see them on Artie’s screen shot. Those sliders are right below Gamma Adjustment, which is the last menu item on Artie’s screenie.
Stunning! I love the optimized image. I would think your cursor was on the splash just to the left of the right most bird, the fact that this area was blown out didn’t matter because you were not bothered about retrieving detail in such a small part of the frame (that isn’t important to the overall image). I agree with Landon that I might prefer an optimized image somewhere in between the original and your edit, in terms of colour intensity. Beautiful lighting conditions, ‘Fire in the Mist’ came into my head straight away.
Jake
Thanks. Specular highlights need to live in all their brightness. If you try to tone them down you turn the image to mud 🙂
Thanks, but I am sticking with my perception of the colors. See my reply to Maggi and others on that 🙂
with love, artie
Artie: I love the color of the optimized image.
Hi Dr. Fish, Me too 🙂 Folks who have not seen a fire in the mist sunrise cannot imagine the rich colors and the excitement 🙂 Many thanks.
a
Love the rich color in this image. Reminds me of a Bosque image you made a few years earlier.
Hi James, Me too 🙂 Many thanks.
a
I can appreciate both the original image and the reworked one. I would prefer something in between. I love your work that looks as close to “as captured” Artie.
I also want to note that I appreciate the step by step of your editing and thought process that comes through on the blog..
cheers
The optimized image was very close to reality. Fire in the mist can be astounding. The best part for me was that I saw it coming 🙂
with love, artie
I like the orange better. Ill be there in March Artie, maybe Ill get some of that fire. Too bad you didn’t get to Zanjero Park to see the owls.
MQ,
Thanks. Assuming that by “orange” you mean the optimized version, me too, but only by 1000 miles! I am coming back to PHX in late February so I might just go see the owls sitting in the mesquite trees!
with love, artie
Hi Artie, Why no exposure compensation on this one?
Mike
We only add or subtract light when we need to move the histogram either left or right. Here at zero the histogram was perfect with no EC. It happens on occasion 🙂
with love, artie
ps: in this situation the light was so bright that I could not read the EC through the viewfinder so I simply kept checking the histogram. When there were blinkies I raised the shutter speed. That’s how I got to 1/64000 sec.!
with love, artie
I prefer the colouring of the original, the excellent optimised image is just too ‘yellow’ for my personal taste.
Thanks for commenting. The scene in life was much more like the optimized version than the K6000 RAW file … Folks think that by working at K7500 the colors are always juiced up but sometimes K7500 is the correct WB in these conditions.
with love, artie
Sweeeeet!
Reminds me of those Bosque mornings.
Doug
For sure. But a lot warmer.
Thanks with love, artie