Uploads from bob1217

Ruby Throat

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Tue, 14 May 2013 20:57:17 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

A hummer that visited our deck today. This is one of four (two males and two females) that we first spotted in our yard on May 3rd and they've been stopping by several times an hour since then. This particular one is the most colorful male we've ever seen here. Two nights ago I saw the most incredible display ever, with the male chasing a female all around, and then chasing her into the hibiscus tree. Then he did that U-shaped courtship dive over and over again while she watched from the hibiscus. Her head kept moving back and forth like she was watching a bunch of skateboarders on the half-pipe!

McMillan Wharf

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:17:47 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

McMillan Wharf in Provincetown on Cape Cod

If Weeds Were Dollars

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Fri, 03 May 2013 17:57:32 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

A flowery weed growing out of the stone wall in our backyard. This is a silver dollar plant. In the spring it has tiny flowers like this, about one inch in diameter. In the fall, the flowers turn to round translucent silvery discs about the size of a silver dollar.

Nikon D700 and Nikkor 105mm f/2.8 macro ("micro") lens, tripod mounted with VR switched off. I set up two Nikon SB-900 strobes off-camera, one from behind on camera left and one from above and camera right. The strobes were fired by two Pocket Wizard Flex TTLs, a Pocket Wizard Mini TT1, and a Pocket Wizard AC3 Zone Controller to set up a strong cross light.

1/60 second @ f/40, ISO 640, Exposure Bias -2 EV

The Blind Can See

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 17:34:43 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

This is a knothole in an old bird blind that sits along the side of a salt marsh. I've been here many times before but never paid attention to all the knotholes in there. I started looking around while Jan watched the birds, and suddenly faces started appearing. I couldn't decide if it was creepy or funny, or maybe a little of both.

One thing I like about photography is that it forces me to notice the small details that I always used to overlook, take for granted, or obscure into a bigger and more boring perspective. I find that if I look at those details very closely, they can literally come to life. When that happens, it helps me compose the shot if I title the image, give it a personality, or develop a 1-sentence story before I actually shoot it. Once I know what I want the image to say, it's a lot easier to shoot it. In this case, I saw the eye and was going to shoot it in landscape orientation. But the more I studied it, I saw the outline of a nose, and I knew it had to be shot in portrait orientation. The image was already titled before I snapped the shot.

Shot hand-held with a Nikon D700 and Nikkor 200mm f/4 "micro" lens. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Cloudy Falls, Cloudy Day

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 09:44:34 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

I've shot this waterfall a bazillion times. Yesterday I went back with a photographer friend of mine to find some new angles on a familiar old place. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Merrell's Marauder

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sun, 07 Apr 2013 17:15:27 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

I wanted to experiment with my Pocket Wizard Flex TTLs and a couple of flashes to set up a strong crosslight portrait. Molly was my only available model, and being a goofy Golden she has a hard time sitting still for more than a second or two. She ran upstairs, stole one of my Merrell shoes out of my closet (aka, Molly's buffet), and plopped back down in the general vicinity where I was setting up. Always a clown, always looking for attention, and always on the prowl for interesting footwear.... Appropriately titled after the famous WWII commandos.

This is not at all what I was hoping for, but it's a kinda funny pic and it's been a while since I posted a Molly picture.

Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

A Question Arises

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 18:18:29 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

A baby fern rises from the forest floor.

Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Ninja Orchid

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 16:36:13 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

From the archives. I REALLY need to get out and shoot some new material....

Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Tulip In Sepia

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 19:51:03 -0700

bob1217 posted a photo:

A tulip that I photographed on my deck a couple of years ago. Processed using the blue channel only to bring out details in the petals, with a low opacity sepia layer added. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Winter Barn

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 05:18:45 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

I adjusted the in-camera Nikon Picture Control settings to try to achieve a more saturated Velvia film look. These adjustments start with Nikon's "Vivid" setting and take saturation, sharpness, and brightness up by varyng degrees. Because picture control settings are proprietary to Nikon, I can import these settings into Nikon Capture NX software, which allows me to adjust RAW (NEF) files to achieve the same effect as if the settings were applied in-camera. The image is then converted to TIFF 16 bit format and then brought into Photoshop for final edits. This shot is from the archives, with Velvia-like settings applied.

Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Threadbare

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 14:20:12 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

100-year old Japanese thread maples in the autumn. From the archives. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Velvia Falls

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 20:48:37 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

Trying a new look here. This is a shot I took of partially frozen Southford Falls. I created a custom in-camera "Picture Control" to mimic Fujichrome Velvia. To do this I modified the standard Nikon "Vivid" picture control by taking up the sharpness, brightness, contrast, and saturation by varying degrees, while leaving the hue untouched. The picture control resides in-camera and is also integrated into Nikon Capture NX for initial NEF processing, and then imported as a 16-bit TIFF into Photoshop CS5 for additional tweaking (spot removal and CA adjustments). The predominantly B&W scene here doesn't really do a Velvia look justice, since Velvia was valued in large part for its rich color saturation. The treatment did bring out the greens in this long exposure image, which is interesting because Velvia film was prone to reciprocity failure on long exposures, which often resulted in a green color shift.

There is a very similar and almost identical image a little further back in my stream that was taken about a minute earlier from the same tripod location, using Nikon's "Standard" setting. You can see the difference that the customized picture control created.

Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Valentine's Amaryllis

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 15:04:33 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

The second stem of our amaryllis flower produced 4 new blossoms. Nikon D700, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro lens, SB-900 mounted in a 24" Lastolite softbox, direct-fired through two diffuser layers with flash set on manual at 1/8 power, triggered by Pocket Wizards (which explains the "no flash" in the exif data). Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Ice Abstract

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 17:04:50 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

Southford Falls in CT. Just having some PHotoshop Fun while a blizzard rages outside. 2-3 inches of snow per hour, really heavy wind, with thunder and lightning mixed in. Cool. Surprised that we haven't lost our power yet.... This image was cropped, then mirrored using Photoshop's Free Transform and Transform tools. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Bridge On The Mill Pond

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 19:57:48 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

The bridge at Southford Falls State Park on a foggy day. Double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Two Benches And A Tree

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 14:33:06 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

A foggy day at Southford Falls State Park in CT. Looks nice on black -- double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Far Side Of The Amaryllis

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 20:47:44 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

The backside of our amaryllis flower. Please double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Nikon D700 with Nikkor 200mm f/4 Micro lens.

December Marsh Sunset

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 19:55:24 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

Gray's Beach sunset on a cold December day. Please double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

Arctic Explosion

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:09:55 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

A section of Southford Falls that I shot today. It was very foggy out and I wanted to use the fog to even out the tones. The result was a very flat initial image. I'm ashamed to admit it, but I applied the Auto Tone correction in Photoshop CS5 and this is pretty much the result. I made a few minor clone and crop changes as well. No vignetting was applied, the center of the image was just naturally surrounded by shadows. No HDR. Please double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

BTW, I was the only person in the park when I got there and eventually another photographer came along. Turns out it was flickr member Tru-man, whose shots I've been admire for some time now. His work is awesome, check it out!

Nikon D700 and Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 VR with Singh-Ray Vari-N-Duo filter. 1 second @ f/16,
Focal Length 200 mm, ISO 200, +2/3 exposure bias.

Southford Falls

nobody@flickr.com (bob1217) — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 11:52:28 -0800

bob1217 posted a photo:

This image made Explore (#102 on January 30, 2013). Today there was a heavy fog so I went to Southford Falls. I wasn't so much interested in the fog on the falls, but was more interested in the effect the fog would have in evening out the tones. A simple contrast adjustment and conversion to B&W is all that went into this. No HDR although it kind of looks like that at first glance, doesn't it? Please double-click the image, or CLICK HERE to see this and my entire photostream on black.

BTW, I was the only person in the park when I got there and eventually another photographer came along. Turns out it was flickr member Tru-man, whose shots I've been admiring for some time now. His work is awesome, check it out!

Nikon D700 with Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 and Singh-Ray Vari-N-Duo filter, tripod mounted. 1 second @ f/22, ISO 200, no exposure bias.