Lily

Phallic or yonic you decide. I love the sweeping lines leading to the pistol of this lily in full bloom.

Photo for the weekend

The weekend involved some excuses. Sorta lame but it happened. The folks came for the weekend and I spent it entertaining and cooking for them. So...no time out with the camera.

The image was shot at the end of last week and worked in the Orton style. Love the contrast between the scarlet flowers and the brilliant green of the out of focus foliage. No doubt which is the star attraction in the image. The soft in and out of focus of the flower itself is just what I was looking to get, then again the soft impressionist view of the world is what I do best.

HDR to the rescue...dark shadows and dark plants

This image wouldn't have been able to be captured and presented with all this detail had I just shot it for shadows or highlights. To much contrast for the limited range of a digital SLR let alone good old silver based films.

To capture all the details in the shadows and highlights and in-between I bracketed the exposures +/- 2 stops. An HDR File was generated in CS2 then tone mapped in Photomatix. The final post processing was done with virtual photographer to clear out the cyan haze and warm up the shadows a bit.

First Rose of Spring

It is of the English Rose by David Austin named "Wenlock" . It is blooming a few weeks too early but I'll take it along with the other signs that spring and warmer weather is near.

As I love the soft romantic look of the orton style I opted to use that as part of my post processing from the RAW file. In simplest terms I create a duplicate layer as a new background, adjust saturation, increase exposure and blur the layer. Then I use the blending tool, on multiply most of the time, to create the final image. It is then flattened and run through Virtual Photographer to manipulate it further so it takes on the look of the old chromes (and isn't it a shame Kodachrome is going the way of the dinosaur) printed on Cibrachrome print material.

Enjoy my first shot at spring, hope it adds to your day a little bit with the promise of good things to come.

spring tease of things to come...

Lemonade Berry bush in bud

Cactus blossom bud

Spring is oh so close. Even the cactus along the river are getting into the act and displaying tiny buds that will be blossoms in the weeks to come.

Late afternoon clouds

Lazy day, sprinkles and lots of clouds punctuated with rays of brilliant sun made for a perfect day. Late in the day the clouds take on such subtle color, especially this time of year.

Pic of the day for Saturday 3/6/10

Make that a painting. Rather than being out photographing I was one of two featured artists at the Paint n Play 2 Art Studio and Gallery last night. What Heather and I did was a live painting demo. We each did a back ground wash then proceeded to swap and paint on another layer on the others canvas, then repeated. After 4 rounds we had the "finished" products you see here.

Pic for Friday 3-5-2010

Sorry about the delay...I was so busy with prep work for a reception Saturday March 6 I completely forgot to post a daily photo. Today's daily photo is my world at the gallery I am co-hosting with a ceramic artist, Heather Shaw who writes the "Art Girl Monrovia" blog.

Heather and I are doing a twist on the reception as it will be a bit interactive. We will have paint brushes in hand and work on a shared canvas with the audience telling us the colors to use. IT should be an interesting night. The final result will be auctioned to benefit the Monrovia Association of Fine Arts.

For those interested here are the details for tonights reception.

Paint N Play 2 Art Studio and Gallery

418 S Myrtle Ave, Monrovia CA 91016

6:30-9:30PM.

Hawks return means spring is one step closer

Not that our winter has been especially wet, colder than usual but not brutal like back east, I will take the first sign of spring coming when I get it.

Three images from Manifest Equality...

Three HDR images that I did while at the Manifest Equality exhibit in Hollywood. (Gads, do I really live here, pinch me sometimes I find it hard to believe I'm in such a vibrant city).

All three were shot with the intention of doing HDR images. I started by bracketing the exposure +/- 2 stops then using the subsequent RAW files to be combined into an HDR image with Photomatix. The same program did the tonemapping which I used adjusted to have great detail across the tone range by adjusting the microcontrast to the max. In the two outdoor images I ran them through Virtual Photographer to get rid of the slight blue/cyan cast caused by the blue sky interacting with the shadows. Voila...three images from a show that left me speechless. (All the details on the show over at metblogs).

Star with a tail

Or would it be a tale if this picture is worth a 1000 words?

"Hero Wage T-bird"

Of course they had to add in the "smoke weed" which makes me wonder what the entire message is about. I wonder if "T-bird" is the car or the cheap wine?

The image was shot bracketed with HDR file generation in mind. That way I get to keep shadow detail and highlight detail in place while controlling the amount of contrast and shadow depth in this bright contrasty scene.

Baskbetall Sunday...

Tough game, woulda thunk that one team of 7th graders could have so many 6 footers...good game overall, just not the win we were looking for. Got home just in time to see the USA Hockey lose to Canada in overtime. Can't win 'em all, just nice to see it when it does happen from time to time.

ICME: Blue Hand

Spotted another one, this time in Buena Park at their High School gym. Likely completely unrelated to the ones along the SGV Lario River Trail...but there must be some sort of social significance to it.

Rain today. Lots, slightly over 4 inches in 8 hours today with more on the way.

Burnt tree

That's all thats left a big tree that had grown through a fence.

"Soy" for 2/25/10

In spanish I'm told it translates roughly into single person or in this case the single tagger not a team?

In other news Ceramic Artist Heather Shaw and myself are teaming up to host an artists reception. One with a twist...both of us will be there with paint brush in hand on one canvas. This should be interesting as though both love impressionists and paint in that style she's an up close and personal still life kinda gal and am more of a broad stroke landscapist. Regardless, the final result will be up for silent auction bid with the proceeds going to the Monrovia Association of Fine Artists and all the work they do supporting the arts in the area.

Mark you calender for the evening of March 6, 2010. It will be held at the Paint n Play 2 Art Studio and Gallery at 418 S Myrtle Avenue in Monrovia, CA 91016. Time is 6:30-9PM.

Wild Flower from Raw

First of the wild flowers in bloom along the San Gabriel River. Post processed from a RAW file to correct for color and contrast (heavy overcast day today). Final image washed in Optiverve's Virtual Photographer to mimic the saturation and warm shift of the old Kodachromes.

Image for 2/23/09:Selective desaturation

I like the look of this final image. In a way it reminds me of the selectively recolored black and white photo's from back in the 30's and 40's. Some studios were still doing it in the 50's as I have floating around somewhere a portrait of my grandparents done just that way. Very interesting effect when part is hand colored and part is simply left shades of gray.

Study in clouds...

Influenced by the old Dutch Masters I set out to shoot clouds today. Nothing more. Nothing less. These HDR images were compiled from RAW files shot bracketed +/- 2 stops from normal.

ICME: "Parsnip" Pete

It was one of those omg (all lower case) moments. Parsnip??? Whatever happened to "Peter Cottontail"...oh yeah prolly those pesky copyright thingys.

Another Saturday spent in Basketball Tournament

Basketball all morning.

Knees shot from all the walking this past week.

Gumbo for dinner.

2 out of three ain't bad.

Its Friday, 'nuff said

New Milestone in the daily camera walk

You will have to check flickr to see what else I shot today. This image isn't particularly stunning or show stopping. It does however have great importance to me. I started walking at mile marker 35.50...this represents 2 miles one way. Allowing for meanderings off the trail for shooting and some exploring that is 4 miles solid walking, part of my resolution this year to "ask myself what can I do to live in a healthier way".

cactus blossoms up close and personal

I went back for more today. As good an excuse as any to take a camera out for a walk.

Power of 3

I wrote about it a while back the "rule of three" in that odd numbered items tend to grab our eyes and be more pleasing design wise. Applies to photo, writing and wiccans. Google it for yourself once and see what you come up with.

I liked this image of all I shot this morning. The contrast between this years bloom and last years remnants, the 2 objects setting up a fading perspective to the snow covered mountains in the back. The contrast of the light yellow blossoms against the brilliant blue sky (its 80's again today in the LA area...not bad for February).

This was shot bracketed, not for the purpose of HDR imaging, but a fine bracket of 1/2 stop +/- from "normal". The subsequent RAW file I fine tuned the exposure further. Voila...shadow detail, brilliant sky and of course all the details in the sunlight pale yellow blossoms.

Red X

Two wins today...

The last game was a 36-26 win that put us in the semi-finals at 9AM on Presidents Day. In Anaheim again.

Didn't get out for shooting...much that is

So I didn't get out for a walk with the camera. I attended a long day of games with my youngest son in Anaheim. That's him, #15 in action during the game. Life can either interfere or enhance your ops with a project, I'm taking the latter option.

PS...they won all their games today.

False Color for Friday 2-12-2010

I spent a little time reworking an image I liked with false colors in part to see what would happen. This time around I experimented with the idea of contrasting colors. In this case I used deep purpley-blues to make the bright yellow flower "pop" better. It worked.

To get here I took a RAW file and opened it with CS2. I used highlighted the background and used the replace color option choosing the purpley-blues to be substituted in for the natural muted gray/green of the plants leaves. I then used virtual photographer to emulate an older Kodak Ektachromes contrast and color depth, manipulating contrast further to get to this image.

View from the River

The little stroll into the world of Black and White continues. Now to find a paper that will give the prints justice and be archival. A trip to Swain's in Glendale is like in order for a paper run.

Fresh Snow in the San Gabriel Mountains

The snow came down low(ish) during yesterdays storm. "Ish" as in about 2,500 feet which was not quite low enough to get me into real snow for shooting this morning.

I shot this with the B&W option on my EOS 20D, maximum file size for best detail. I opted to use the "red" filter option to darken the sky to increase the contrast with the clouds and snow details on the distant peak. That filter option made the green of the plants in the foreground darker in tone as well to further accentuate the bright white of the clouds and the snow.

This image is show on CA Highway 39 near where it is blocked off with barricades along the West Fork of the San Gabriel River. Aside from the stunning mountain views, this stretch of road is one of my favorites to just get in a car and "drive" and enjoy the twisties.

Great little stencil

Urban Art from along the Lario Bike trail. Its new, still bright colors. Only a matter of time before it gets tagged over or removed by the LA County Dept of Parks. Until then its there for all to enjoy. Actuall size is about 6 by 8 inches so that was some intricate stencil cutting.

San Gabriel River and San Gabriel Mountains

Today I hiked the river. Intent was to concentrate on just shades of gray and contrast. I dialed in slowest relative ISO for minimum noise and maximum detail. Whilst I was at it I selected the "red" photo-filter option so the jpegs would have the appearance of a black and white film shot through a red filter.

Back in the day of Black and White silver based photography one would slap on a real "RED" filter, deep red no less for a variety of reasons. For landscape photography it lightened the yellows and reds of flowers while making the blue sky and green foliage darker. You did this in particular when you wanted to accentuate the sky and get better cloud detail. With portraiture it tended to help lighten the skin and even out the complexion. Obviously I went for cloud detail today.

Of course, I shot with RAW/Jpeg combo. The RAW images have all the detail and colors there just in case I get a wild hair and want to do something with them one of these days.

Rosebud and the promise of spring.

Shot bracketed. Love the detail in the texture of the stem and the bud itself. It was shot bracketed and the one 1 stop over average worked out the best for shadow detail. Post processed from RAW and minimal jpeg compression in final image.

Not a day out with a camera, with reason though.

Today my youngest who plays competitive basketball had a tournament. So when everyone else was huddled in their home avoiding the rain storm I was out and about with another tournament. We had one great win...62-23.

This should count as a daily photo even though I took it with the trusty cell phone.

Misty Skies...an exploration in Black and White

Hmmm...the little meander this morning made me think in terms of shades of gray as much as muted color on a rainy day. Looking back at what I shot this grabbed my attention and begged me to work into a B&W image. Am glad I did, its fun to meander down that path that is so close to my roots.

Its raining today...

To call it rain is a bit of a stretch. More like spitting misty stuff but I'll take it as it is good for the gardens. It also makes for a nice meander once one is all bundled up.

Today's images were worked from HDR files created from 3 RAW exposures representing normal, 2 stops over and 2 stops under-exposure. I used both Photomatix and CS2 for generating the HDR files. Photomatix did the tone mapping as I like the controls available in it better than CS2. (Someone wanna get me CS4 as I hear it really rocks for HDR work?).

I also meandered down the black and white path with one of the images. I liked the composition of the hard edged bridge against the natural slope of the mountains in the back ground. The framing accentuates the more flowing slopes of the hills in contrast to the sharp curvilinear edges of the arch on the bridge. I think I like the B&W version better as its lack of color accentuates the contrast better.

What I did today instead of shooting...

I actually entered a piece in this show. I actually was busy with the arts and blogging in general which kept me from the camera. The full post can be found over at LA Metblogs. Tomorrow is another day n'est ce pas?

Another walk...and an icme

It caught my eye. A truck crossing sign posted in a ditch. The bike path I was on had one right on the edge of the roadway where you would expect it. But a ditch? Why oh why begs to be asked.

Mile Marker 37...a new personal best

Today I set out to fulfill one of my goals towards a healtier me and went for a walk. Along the San Gabriel River trail as its an easy walk with plenty to keep me visually entertained. Easy to get a quick pace going to help with the cardio and simple calorie burning, its all good.

One of the first things I spotted was the orange hazard cone in the midst of some plants and rocks. Why? Beats me but someone must know the answer, just to lazy to start making calls to the city of Duarte to find out why its there.

Along the way there was a brief icme moment where I spotted something green among all the grayed over concrete that lines the river edges. Closer inspection revealed it to be a survey marker from 1960. All these years and still undisturbed.

Mile marker 37 was a new personal best for me. Fast paced walk that was supposed to be 2 miles turned into 3 when I decided to push it a bit. Just keep moving forward to live in a healthier direction, one day at a time.

Happy February 1st.

It was an artsy fartsy kind of day. Brought out the trusty che-ez snap and grabbed a few shots of the hibiscus in bloom on the patio. Love that crazy little camera, no focus control, no color control, no contrast control...but the images it yields are totally artistic in nature...very impressionistic. I like it that way.

(This would have been posted yesterday but the day was pretty hectic so my apologies for making you wait).