Stuff
We have continued to be blessed with almost perfect sky conditions for each photo session. On our single clear blue sky morning we worked indoors in one of my very favorite barns and worked the shaded side of some old trucks and farm vehicles.
The Streak
Just in case you have not been counting, today –with this blog post being published just under the wire late on Monday, June 20 — makes 21 days in a row with a new educational blog post 🙂
2017 UK Puffins and Gannets IPT. Monday July 3 through Wednesday July 12, 2017: $5999 + $1499: Limit 10 photographers — Openings: 5). The (really cheap) two-day Gannet/Bass Rock Add-on is now part of the trip.
Please call 863-692-0906 for info on the substantial Late Registration Discount.
Here is some great info on the July 2017 UK Puffins and Gannets IPT: I have finalized the cottage and vehicle rental arrangements. We have room for several additional folks, at least for a couple and single. And I am in position, as noted above, to offer a rather substantial late registration discount. Please call us at 863-692-0906 or get in touch via e-mail. Click here and scroll down for additional details and the travel plans.
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.
Please Don’t Forget …
As always–and folks have been doing a really great job for a long time now–please remember to use our B&H links for your major and minor gear purchases. For best results, use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. And please remember also that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would of course appreciate your business.
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This in-camera Art Vivid image was created on the morning of Monday, 12 June on the 2017 Palouse IPT with the Induro GIT 304L/Mongoose M3.6-mounted Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM lens, the Canon Extender EF 1.4X III, and my favorite bird photography camera, the Canon EOS 5D Mark IV. ISO 400. Evaluative metering +1 stop (+/- 1 stop) yielded a base exposure of 1/320 sec. at f/11 in Manual mode. K4500. LensAlign/FocusTune micro-adjustment: -1. With all of my in-camera JPEGs I use my still flower technique: 2-second time with Live View for mirror lock-up. I used rear focus and release with the Flexi-Zone single box on the middle of the three windows. Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Important note: I use rear button focus for all of my landscape and Urbex photography. Old Gray Barn in canola field |
Killer Find …
On the long drive to Palouse Falls State Park on Sunday evening, we noted some nice canola fields along WA 26. We headed that way again the next day after a successful early morning session. After passing by a few fields we hit bingo with a beautiful gray barn just beyond a large field of canola in bloom.I used all of my focal length capabilities from 8mm to 1000mm. The boys and girls had a ton of fun. Though I made lots of very good images, today’s featured image was my favorite.
K4500 Trick
As noted here many times previously, for best results when creating in-camera Art Vivid JPEGs in most conditions, setting the WB to K4500 will tone down the YELLOWs. This helps to create natural looking YELLOWs and natural-looking GREENs as well. The YELLOWs in today’s blog post look perfectly natural to me while the roof is much more richly colored than in the individual RAW files.
Image Design Question …
Why didn’t I point the lens down a lot more so as to include more of the yellow canola field? Additional comments on the image, on the color, or on the image design are of course welcome.
More Thoughts on In-camera HDR Image Quality
We spent some serious time during our Monday Photoshop session comparing the image quality of a single in-camera Art Vivid HDR JPEG with the image quality of a RAW file from the same sequence. Even though I used Live View for mirror lock with the 2-second timer we noted some image issues from gear shake, especially with the leading edge of the corrugated, galvanized steel roof where we noted some improper alignment. That said, I had Auto Align disabled. With Auto Align enabled, the image will be be cropped about 3-4% automatically. I will continue to explore these issues by enabling Auto Align and simply framing a bit wider … And then I will report back here.
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.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above, and for everything else in the new store, we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and those who will be visiting the New BIRDS AS ART Online Store as well.
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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 :).
Nice image really like the contrast of the yellow against the barn.
If you had begun to show more of the canola, the canola would have become the subject with the barn as a back ground, not your intent. The yellow is so vivid now that it almost overpowers the interesting old barn.
agree with Jeff and Doug regarding why you didn’t point the camera lower to get more of the canola.
I can see this hanging in a gallery!
This is a nice shot. I really like the framing a lot. I like that the barn fills most of the space and is encircled by the amazing yellow, then green fields. The blue-grey colors of the barn really pop. Also, given the angle that you used, we can see the front wall of the barn seems to be leaning towards our right and even the three windows are crooked. All this really adds a lot of character to the image. The way the roof is built, out of corrugated metal – some a creamy blue grey, others are tinged with rust and about 3 panels up the roof makes an angled turn – so we can see its not just sloped – maybe it goes up into a tall point. Anyway, really great photo. Might also be interesting to see it in a grainy black and white shot.
You didn’t go lower cause you’d probably lose the ‘blue’ stripe going across
the roof.
Doug
I love how the colors turned out in this image. You used Art Vivid but there is a lovely softness to the colors.
You did not point the camera lower to get more of the canola field as you wanted to get as much of the Barn roof as possible