Cauldron of Fire

Cauldron of Fire - M240, 35 'lux.

We went on an all day trip to the other side of the island (Hilo) yesterday, including visiting the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  One interesting image to make in this area is after the sun has set; the glow of the lava lights up the smoke.  It is however extremely challenging to photograph.  The light is slow, the smoke is moving and the dynamic range is insane.  I played around for a bit with a longer focal length but just before leaving decided to experiment with capturing frames for an HDR.  I figured it wouldn't work out well since the smoke is moving.  I tried to keep the exposure times from being crazy by changing the aperture instead as well as the shutter speed.  In the end, it worked; I got the detail of the rim of the crater as well as in the smoke and as a bonus even got some constellations in the sky.

Aloha

M240, 75, ~f/3.4, 1/180s, ISO 200

Aloha from the Big Island.  Yesterday was spent mostly shopping for supplies and one point we walked through a market and though I've seen my share of pineapples, I liked the way these were lined up.

My Favorite Lightroom 5 Feature

Adobe started shipping Lightroom 5 yesterday and though the public beta has been available for a while, I didn't use it that much for my day to day images.  However, now that its official, it was time to switch and there are two features that are going to be very useful to me.  First is "Upright" which automatically applies rotation correction as well as horizontal and vertical distortion correction.  Second and arguably even more powerful is radial local adjustments.  I've been waiting to use something like this on the image above because I wanted a vignette which didn't apply to the Penguins but did to the ocean and the beach below.  Here's what the image looks like without the adjustment.

What I really like about this new tool is that its very simple, yet extremely powerful.  With just a few clicks you can specify an ellipse, orient it and then apply whatever local adjustments either to the region covered by the ellipse or its inverse.  Only one slider option, "feather, and nothing else to make it complicated.  Yet with the ability to define an ellipse and orient it arbitrarily and stack multiples non-destructively, for the many this becomes a really powerful tool.

Sea Arch and Flowers

Sea Arch and Flowers - Alpa STC, IQ 180, 32 HR, ~f/13, 2s, ISO 35.  ~11mm rise, 2 degrees tilt.

Ah that rugged Northern California coast, I just don't think I can get tired of it.  Yesterday, I drove out to Monterey to meet friend and follow photographer +Greg Mitchell for a sunset shoot.  This was an area that both of us knew about and Greg had scouted the area in the morning identifying this as the image to make for sunset.  We had lots of time on our hands so we spent a couple of hours hiking around various spots to see if we could find something better; we didn't.  There was good overhead cloud but there was also a dense layer of clouds in the distance to the west.  This usually means the sun goes behind those clouds and there is no color.  We did end up getting some beautiful colors once the sun had set, but my favorite image on the evening was this one, moments before the sun sunk below the horizon.  There was still enough warm light to highlight the flowers in the foreground and just a hint of color in the sky.  I still had to use lots of filtration to bring the sky under control and pull up the shadows in the foreground, but I got away without resorting to HDR and all the work that goes with it.

Antarctic Terns by Risting Glacier

Antarctic Terns by Risting Glacier - 5D3, 70-200 II + 1.4x @ 280, f/4, 1/2500s, ISO 200

Moving away from snow and back to glaciers this is a close up of Risting Glacier, the same glacier from my post a couple of days ago.  There were Antarctic Terns flying around close to the water and I'd tried to capture them with a longer lens but they are fast and move erratically, so instead I focused on the glacier itself using the terns to show just how huge the glacier is.

Lichens and Snow

Lichens and Snow - 5D3, 70-200 IS II + 1.4x TC @ 280, f/5, 1/640s, ISO 100

Continuing the theme of images involving snow I give you Licens and Snow.  I made this image during a zodiac cruise of Larsen Harbour.  I got lucky with the light as the clouds obscured the sun the moment this image was made which is why so much detail and pattern can be seen in the snow.  When I saw this scene I knew I wanted to bring to attention the patterns in the snow but also use the rock and the colorful Lichen growing on it as a contrasting anchor.

Risting Glacier at the head of Drygalski Fjord

Risting Glacier at the end of Drygalski Fjord - 5D3, 24-70 II @ 24mm, f/7.1, 1/500s, ISO 100

Last time it was snow and clouds in black & white and today its snow, glacier and clouds in color.  This is Risting Glacier located at the head of Drygalski Fjord.  We had dramatic clouds that morning for a  cruise down the Fjord and the blue of the glacier was very intense.

Snow and Clouds - King Haakon Bay

Snow and Clouds - 5D3, 70-200 IS II @ 70mm, f/5.6, 1/500s, ISO 100

I had a berth in the lowest deck of the ship on my South Georgia trip last fall and this meant no portholes.  So when I wake up in the morning, its pitch black and I have no idea what the conditions are like outside.  Several mornings during the trip I managed to convince myself the light would be great and get up to the observation lounge and this was one of those mornings.

We were going to go for a landing at Cave Cove in King Haakon Bay that morning and waking up at 6, I quickly got ready and went upstairs hoping for some dramatic sky.  The sun kept going behind and then emerging from layers of light cloud, giving some really nice light.

I had originally fully intended to keep this image in color.  I love images with snow, clouds and glacier in them as there are subtle color differences (and not so subtle with glaciers) but in this case the black & white appealed to me more bringing more attention to the differences in texture and tone, even though I had to sacrifice not having the blue of glacier at the bottom.

Giraffe Dance

Giraffe Dance - 1Ds3, 70-200 IS II @ 200mm, f/5.6, 1/200s, ISO 100

Two Giraffe spotted on the way from the Ngorongoro Crater to Kusini Camp in the Serengeti.  When these Giraffe were spotted, we stopped for a look and that moment the one on the right scooted over to the other one.  This mid jump capture kind of looks like they are dancing.

King Penguin Colony at Right Whale Bay

King Penguin Colony - 5D3, 24-70 II @ 35mm, f/8, 1/320s, ISO 100, 12 panels.

Continuing the theme of high resolution panoramics from South Georgia, here's one of a King Penguin colony at Right Whale Bay.  Click through to zoom in and pan around on this 83mp panorama; all those tufts of brown fur up the hills are the juveniles.