Uploads from TheFella, tagged canon

Monkey On The Steps

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Mon, 20 May 2013 01:27:10 -0700

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A Macaque monkey roams across the coloured steps deep inside the Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 6400 / f/2.8 / 1/200s / Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 190mm / Location: Batu Caves, Malaysia

Setting Off

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 16:01:51 -0700

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A cormorant fisherman sets off down the Li River.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 6400 / f/4 / 1/6s / Canon 17-40mm f/4.0 @ 17mm / Location: Yangshuo, China

Sunken

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 01:21:25 -0700

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A sunken shipwreck off the Tan Jetty in Penang, Malaysia.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/8 / 20s / Canon 17-40mm f/4.0 @ 40mm / Location: Penang, Malaysia

The Giant's Red Rock

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 01:04:00 -0700

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Long exposure of an inlet at the Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 50 / f/20 / 15s / Canon 17-40mm f/4.0 @ 23mm / Location: Giant's Causeway, United Kingdom

Distant Volcano

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 00:58:25 -0700

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I don't want to post too many Iceland photos in a row (no matter how tempting it is), so here is a shot from another amazing country beginning with 'I'.

Indonesia.

This was taken at sunrise during a special tour put on by my hotel. As it was winter, it was pretty quiet, so that suited me down to the ground.

I think this is Mount Merapi in the distance, but this temple is surrounded by nine volcanoes, so it's anyone's guess!

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/distant-volcano.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/16.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

The Lion City

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 01:03:50 -0700

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For such a large city, the centre of Singapore can be pretty quiet sometimes.

I had wandered down to the marina for sunrise I was shortly confronted by this fantastic blue hour. Apart from one other photographer who quickly disappeared, I was the only person around.

This provided a love sense of peace and serenity. I happily walked around picking out different compositions and waiting for the sun to rise up.

Thankfully, probably due to the rainy season, this blue hour had some very interesting clouds; I hate clear skies, even during blue hour or sunrise / sunset.

The title of this photo come from the nickname of Singapore, the Lion City, which is a direct translation from the Malay word Singapura.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/the-lion-city.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 26mm / HDR

Jakarta Traffic

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 15:23:49 -0800

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Most of my Indonesia shots seem to be landscapes and temples.

Here is one of my only cityscapes, taken during a rooftop session with Franciscus Tan, Adri Syahfril Koto Piliang and Citra Dita Valentin a few months ago. It was a pretty weird sky.

With so many things going on, it was quite a hard shot to compose, but I ended up going with this one. Let me know what you think.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/jakarta-traffic.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 50 / f/22.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

Hong Kong Sunset

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 00:26:00 -0800

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There is an iconic view of Hong Kong, one which I have taken myself. It's from this exact spot, but I decided to also post a nice day-time one as well. Although not uncommon, shots at this time from the peak are fewer and further between than the night photographs.

Myself and Greg had got up to the viewing point early, as we always do. As the sun started setting, we started shooting a few frames. Even though the sun was behind us, out of frame, there was still some lovely light on the city, stretching back into Kowloon.

Thankfully there were also a few clouds, otherwise the sky would have been mighty dull.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/hong-kong-sunset.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/11.0 / 17-40mm @ 19mm / HDR

The Colours of Penang

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 00:26:47 -0800

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Compared with the UK, Malaysia always seems to have beautiful sunsets and sunrises. Even when I went during rainy season, 100% of sunrises and 80% of sunsets were fantastic.

This particular sunset was when I was standing in the ocean to the north of Penang Island at a place called Batu Ferringhi.

Due to this being Malaysia, the water is always warm, so I could happily wade out to quite some depth (taking care not to stand on any crabs).

The sunset started out weak, but then broke through the clouds and gave me all sorts of different colours and patterns on the storm clouds overhead. At one point, the colours in the clouds ended abruptly at a huge black cloud in which you could see lightning strikes; very surreal combination.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/the-colours-of-penang.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 50 / f/20.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

Bromo Night Sky

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 15:38:42 -0800

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This is definitely one of the most alien landscapes I've ever visited; A giant crater containing a desert tundra and four volcanoes.

To get to the viewpoint for sunrise, you need to get up at around 03:00. We decided to get up a bit earlier to see what the sky was like.
Sadly, due to it being rainy season, it was very cloudy. Every now and again, we (myself and Fran) got a break in the clouds and it was nice to see the stars peeking through.

Although there was no Milky Way, I quite enjoy the layers created in this photo.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/bromo-night-sky.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 2000 / f/5.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / Manual blending

Light From Above

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:52:07 -0800

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This was definitely one of the coolest and most photogenic places in Kuala Lumpur, the Batu Caves.

As well as some stunning scenery and cool (if somewhat angry) monkeys, this cave also contains a Hindu temple.
Although most people who increase the dynamic range in photos like to get every single last bit of detail out of it, I like to develop for the mood of the image. In this case, I could have shown the top of the cave and the sky, as I took 9 exposures, but I quite liked the way the image fades to a blown out white.

You might disagree, but I prefer this approach.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/light-from-above.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/16.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

Storm on the Causeway Coast

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 00:04:15 -0800

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When I was at home in Belfast over christmas, I wanted to get up to the Giant's Causeway for some sunrise photo opportunities. Sadly the weather was awful for most of the time.

On my final chance, I thought I'd risk it. It was freezing, but stayed reasonably dry. Until I actually started taking pictures.
The wind really picked up and the rain was hitting me from all directions. I had to rest a lot of my weight on the tripod to stop it getting blown over. The benefit was some great waves crashing over the famous hexagonal rocks of the causeway.

Technical info

This is actually about 6 photos in one. Although the waves were all in the space of about 20 seconds, they didn't quite all get captured in the one frame. I added them back in, plus a long exposure with my 10-stop neutral density filter for the rocks in the middle of the outcrop.

Finally I upped the contrast and made it monochrome for a more dramatic feel.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/storm-on-the-causeway-coast.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 200 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 23mm / Manual blending

The Fisherman and The Lamp

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 00:03:14 -0800

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This was very, very early in the morning. Myself and Greg had arisen at about 04:00 and Sam drove us to this point on the river.

I pulled out the camera and tried shooting this cormorant fisherman, but it was so humid, even at this time in the morning, that my lens started fogging up.

Thankfully, the condensation actually gave this quite pleasing burst of light from the lamp. There is hardly any processing done to this shot, just some white balance, sharpening and denoising.

I managed to get another shot as he set off down the river...

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/the-fisherman-and-the-lamp.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 6400 / f/4.5 / 17-40mm @ 36mm

Singapore Sunrise

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 00:03:47 -0800

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There are two things that I've become a fan of recently; long exposures during sunrise or sunset and the manual blending of images.

Luckily, this photo combines both of these loves!
I had wandered through town at about 05:30 and arrived at Marina Bay, which luckily only took me 10 minutes due to my reasonably central location near Clarke Quay.

I had figured this location would be very popular with photographers, but there was only one other guy there for sunrise. I took a few standard shots and then stuck on my 10-stop neutral density filter; something I seem to do during most sessions now (apart from night-time ones, obviously).

Once I spent a few minutes getting some shots of this fantastic sunrise, I had another walk, this time around the bay, back towards town. As I arrived around the corner, about 30 people arrived for a photowalk. You'd think that if you're going for a very early morning photowalk, you wouldn't arrive 10 minutes after sunrise?!

Technical Info

This was two LE shots, one at 100 seconds and one at 180 seconds. These were manually blended together using masking (layer, not luminance this time) to compensate for some blown out areas around the sun.

More technical info

As some of you might have heard, I have now sold all my Canon gear and gone to Nikon. I'm not a particular fan boy of either; both systems have their good and bad points. I was looking to upgrade my year and a half old, second hand, Canon 5D MKII. I looked into getting another MKII, a MKIII or a Nikon D800.

After a lot of consideration about what I needed and my style of shooting, I settled on the D800. This is currently the best tool for the job (at least my job), plus it now allows me to shoot with the Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 - arguably the best ultra-wide-angle in the world.

To complete the lens line-up, I also have a 28-300mm, 50mm f/1.4 and 85mm f/1.8.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/singapore-sunrise.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / Manual blending

The Waterfall of Light

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:38:22 -0800

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This really does need to be seen large and on black! Really!

Yes, I know it's a bit of an arty title, but then again, it's a bit of an arty shot!

This is actually a rarely taken scene from a hugely popular location - Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park in Indonesia, containing Mount Bromo, a currently active volcano.
Sometimes, where there is a violent volcanic eruption, the ground left can collapse, leaving a massive crater knows as a caldera. In this particular one, the Tengger Caldera, it also left five smaller volcanoes in the middle of it; Mount Bromo being the most popular of these.

The land inside the caldera is mostly barren landscape, known as The Sea of Sand, the edges of which can rise up to 600 metres. It was on one of these high edges that I saw this wonderful scene.

Everyone was busy snapping away at the sunrise hitting Mount Bromo (and the other volcanoes) in the middle, whereas I had turned my back to see what was happening behind us.

The low, rising sun was streaming across this tree-filled plain on the lush ground surrounding the caldera. That, coupled with the low-lying clouds in the basin meant that the beams of light from between the trees became very prominent.

At the time when I took this shot, I knew I'd like it, but I wasn't too sure how to process it. I tried black and white first and bingo, that was the one. This is pretty much straight out of camera with just some monochroming, slight denoising, slight selective sharpening and some contrast work.

I think this shot is a love it or hate it shot, but I hope you love it as I do!

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/the-waterfall-of-light.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/4.0 / @ 165mm

Kuala Lumpur

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 06:31:44 -0800

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My first stop on my tour of South East Asia was Malaysia and my first stop in this country was the capital, Kuala Lumpur.

After researching lots of shots of this fantastic city, I had decided that I had to get the iconic shot of the Petronas Towers (sometimes called the Twin Towers) during the blue hour.
There are very few places to get a good angle and even fewer that are publicly accessible. The best one I managed to find was The Traders Hotel. On the 33rd floor of this is the SkyBar; a fancy, but relaxed bar with a swimming pool right in the middle of it.

Even better (for me) than mid-drink swimming was the massive open windows that faced out towards the Petronas Towers. Although you're not allowed tripods here, the windows, when open, actually form a ledge about two feet wide.

Using a stabilising platform carefully crafted out of my long trousers (for mosque work) and spare shirt, I was able to have my camera steady enough to get seven night-time brackets of the KL skyline.

Technical Stuffs

This was an HDR composed of seven exposures, from -3 EV to +3EV. These were processed in Photomatix, then the original exposures were gradually blended through manually in Photoshop. Areas like the sky and ground are probably 90% one exposure (although not the same exposure).

This was finished off by a lot of colour correction to make it vibrant, but not to make it look wholly unnatural. Nik Software's Viveza was also used to tweak particular parts of the image to my liking.

This is definitely one photo that I'll have mounted and put on my wall at home! (If you want, you can also buy a print of Kuala Lumpur, with plenty of options of materials and sizes).

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/kuala-lumpur.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

Marina Bay Sands

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 12:07:55 -0800

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This looks much more fantastic when viewed in the lightbox!

Singapore is a photographer's paradise. It's full of amazing architecture, often has amazing sunsets and sunrises due to being in the tropics and also has cool things like lasers shows.

Thankfully one of these laser shows happens twice a night at the Marina Bay Sands and I took this chance to capture it.
I was out walking with my good friend of over a decade, Celia. She has been living and working in Singapore for a number of years and was giving me the lowdown. We had reached the marina / bay and she had to take a phone call, so I saw this as an opportunity and nipped down to the water's edge.

I set up at my (new, awesome, 3 Legged Thing) tripod and only had to wait about 5 minutes for the lasers to start up. It's not a particularly long show, but I snapped away continuously all the way through it, hoping to capture a nice array of beams.

Now onto the slightly more technical information. This photo is actually about five exposures manually blended together. A main shot, one for the building lights along the waterfront, a couple for the lasers from the Marina Bay Sands itself and one for the lasers from the Art Science Museum on the left.

These were all blended together using a number of various methods in Photoshop. Let me know what you think of the result!

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/marina-bay-sands.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 200 / f/5.6 / 17-40mm @ 27mm / HDR

Malacca Straits Mosque

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Thu, 20 Dec 2012 08:48:30 -0800

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I'm just back from almost three weeks touring around South East Asia. First country on my travels was Malaysia, so I decided to post one of these shots first.

I was mainly staying in Kuala Lumpur, but myself and my good friend and photographer Danny Xeero took a day trip down to Malacca / Melaka to catch the sunset.
I got some standard shots of this, the Malacca Straits Mosque, then I decided I would experiment with my 10-stop ND filter. I've used this a bit in the past, but I've really like the results, so I wanted to try some colour sunset shots with it. I was standing right by this rock and figured it would make some pretty good foreground interest.

This shot is a manually blended image from about 4 exposures. It's mostly one, with others blended in for the water and the bright part of the sky. A final, non-ND shot was used to clean up some noise on the mosque itself.

Last night, I had the privilege of joining a Google Hangout with Jimmy McIntyre and HDR One Magazine. As I talked about my HDR workflow, it prompted me to finally get around to writing a tutorial. I'll spend the next week or so working on it and hopefully release it around christmas time.

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/malacca-straits-mosque.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 400 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / Manually blended HDR

Yangshuo Cyclist

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 17:24:54 -0800

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I said in my last photo that I had my heart set on getting that shot. I had planned to get it, tried to get it and would have been annoyed if I hadn't have got it.

This shot was the complete opposite; a spur of the moment, unplanned shot. Turns out, this is one of my favourite photos (of mine) ever!

Myself and Greg were explore some quite remote fields around Yangshuo in Guilin, at this point our guide had pointed out a very old bridge across a small stream. As we were crouched down by the water's edge, I glanced up and saw this old man on a bicycle cycling across this stone bridge.

I suddenly pictured an image in my mind; this lone man cycling along the path in his traditional hat, towards the setting sun, with the famous karst mountains forming the backdrop and framed by this single tree.

I reeling off a huge number of exposures in the hope of capturing anything at all. On reviewing these, picking three for an HDR and a hell of a lot of post-processing to make it just how I'd imagined, this is the result.

You know what? It's even better than I had pictured.

I'm off to Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia tonight, so I'll catch up with everyone when I'm back!

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/yangshuo-cyclist.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 100 / f/8.0 / 17-40mm @ 17mm / HDR

Cormorant Fisherman

nobody@flickr.com (TheFella) — Mon, 19 Nov 2012 16:01:42 -0800

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You can buy prints of this if you so wish!

Sometimes you see a photograph and it compels you to visit a place. When you get there, you know you won't get the same type of photo, but you'll probably try anyway.

After seeing a photo of a cormorant fisherman, most likely on the Li River, I decided I wanted to go there and photograph that. Sure enough, that's what I did. I was pretty happy with the result, but it wasn't all fun and games in the attempt to get it.
Myself and Greg had been staying with Fun Sam in Yangshuo, Guilin when we mentioned that one of these aforementioned fishermen were on our list of things to photograph. He knew of just the spot, but told us we'd have to get up early. After making him get up and drive us around at 04:00 for couple of days now, he soon realised that this would be no problem for us.

We arrived on location around 04:30 and this fisherman arrived out of the darkness from seemingly nowhere. This was just before sunrise in a reasonably remote location, so light was certainly not abundant. I got my camera out and decided to shoot with the 50mm, as it was so dark. I ended up shooting wide open. At about ISO 6400.

This is when the problems started. Because of the temperature, my lens was completely misted up. I wiped it clean and it misted up almost immediately. I rolled off a few shots, but it was hopeless. I kept trying to get a few exposures, while also getting my other lenses out and wiping them down. The fisherman was getting ready to head off and this was a race against time!

After a few average shots with the 50, I bailed and went for the wide angle. This had started to clear somewhat, partly due to my wiping and partly due to the changing conditions. I ran down to the water's edge, probably getting my trainers soaked in the process and snapped away as he backed off from the shore.

This was such a panicked shoot. Probably the one of the most heart-racing ones I've done so far, as I wanted this shot so much. I reviewed the shots later and I was very happy with a lot of the ones I managed to capture.

Something that I really like about this shot, apart from the obvious, is the fantastic diagonal line that has been fortuitously formed by the pole held by the fisherman and the slope of the karst mountain behind him.

I managed to capture another angle using my phone. It's not as good, but I enjoyed taking a lot of mobile shots on that trip; the benefits being instant results and also being able to keep people back home updated (especially as Facebook and Twitter are blocked in China). If you want to keep track of my mobile shots, feel free to follow me on Instagram.

I hope you enjoy this shot; it ended up being a lot of mental and physical effort!

Read this on my blog: thefella.com/blog/cormorant-fisherman.

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Details
Canon EOS 5D Mark II / ISO 400 / f/4.0 / 17-40mm @ 33mm / HDR