Strong wind led to poor fishing conditions at Salmon-a-Rama as heavy waves crashed against the pier on Wednesday, July 14, 2010 at the Reefpoint Marina in Racine, Wis. | Canon 5D Mark II and 24-70mm f/2.8L lens @ 64mm | Exposed 1/2000 sec. @ f/4, ISO 200 (0 EV).

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | Comment! | Updates: EOS 5D Mark II, landscapes, pictorial

Boats anchored near Pugh Marina, Racine, Wis. | Canon 5D Mark II and 70-200mm f/4L IS lens @ 135mm; exposed 1/400 sec. @ f/7.1, ISO 400.

Both Thursday and Friday night I went out to the lakefront in my hometown of Racine, Wis. to reacquaint myself with my old stomping grounds.  The light was a mixed bag both evenings, but the temperatures were mild and it was nice to see the lake that I grew up with.  It’s funny how much I grew to expect to have a significant body of water nearby, even though I didn’t grow up with boats.

When I was in school at Grinnell College, and when I moved to Columbia, Mo. for graduate school, the thing that drove me crazy was how landlocked those places were.  I don’t care if I get out onto the water–I’m not even that fond of swimming–but the Great Lakes (an ocean would do in a pinch, too) are to me what mountains are to some, and rivers are to others: the physical features that make us feel that we belong.

Funny that all of these examples are actually quite lethal environments.  The water wants us in it no more than the mountains want us atop them, and many people die every year in these beautiful places!  In any event, it’s good to be back for a little while as work on my master’s project.

More pictures after the jump!

(...)
Read the rest of Old Michigan steams like a young man’s dreams (102 words)

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | Comment! | Updates: EOS 5D Mark II, Lake Michigan, landscapes

Abandoned barn in late-afternoon light on Hwy. 146, Gilman, Iowa, in November 2004. | Canon 10D and Sigma 12-24mm f/4.5-5.6 EX HSM lens @ 12mm; exposed 1/100 sec. @ f/20, ISO 200.

A couple of months ago, a friend of mine from my days as a student at Grinnell College asked me if I had any landscapes of Iowa that she might frame up for her apartment.  For one reason or another it took me a while to get back to her–sometimes, my e-mail inbox gets a bit clogged.

Original capture of the barn

While going through my landscapes from Iowa, which were less abundant than I expected, truth me told, I found this image of a barn near Gilman, Iowa, which was just a stone’s throw from Grinnell on state Highway 146.  I remembered this image when I saw it: I remembered that I never had the right tools to process it, even though it had a perfect exposure (the histogram went “to the right”).  It’s sharp, too–that Sigma 12-24mm was a strange but surprisingly sharp piece of glass.  At least, my copy of the lens was.  As with anything from Sigma, your mileage may vary.  I purchased it early in 2004, back when it was first introduced for about $500, and there were not many options for getting a truly wide perspective on the APS-C cropped cameras.  Interestingly, the Sigma 12-24mm is now sells for $800.  Crazy little world!

At the time I made this image, I was using Capture ONE from Phase ONE as my primary RAW converter, and found this image to be far too difficult to tone properly.  But here it was, sitting in my Lightroom database, long-since converted to a DNG file (the universal RAW format that all manufacturers should be using, but that’s a topic for another day).

I set a custom white balance, and then established a black point and white point.  Then I adjusted the curves to make the black a little richer–I don’t find going beyond about 9 on the black slider in either Lightroom or Adobe Camera RAW is very effective.  Three brush strokes and a gradient later, the image was ready to go into Photoshop for some final tweaks–normally unnecessary, as I find the global adjustments with the brush and gradient tools for localized toning to be sufficient for my images.

Amazing what you can do with your images now that you couldn’t–or, at least, didn’t know how to–do a few years ago.

What gems are gathering dust in your archive?

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | Comment! | Updates: Canon 10D, landscapes, nature

Entrance to the Devil's Ice Box, Rock Bridge Memorial State Park, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 5D Mark II and 16-35mm f/2.8L II lens @ 20mm; exposed 87 seconds @ f/11, ISO 400.

When I first looked into the opening of the Devil’s Ice Box, I wasn’t sure what would happen with a time exposure.  There was barely enough light to focus on the rocks–I was lucky that all of the mist above caused by the hot, humid air hitting the cool air from the cave was creating a giant diffuser.  Essentially, localized cloudy conditions on a sunny evening.  I was surprised at the colors that were revealed in the first time exposure–I started at 30 seconds at ISO 800.  I re-adjusted for a bulb exposure at ISO 400 for less noise.  You can see this same sliver of stream passing underground through the cave system in the photo below:

Looking down into the Devil's Ice Box, Rock Bridge Memorial State Park, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 5D Mark II and 16-35mm f/2.8L II lens @ 16mm; exposed 13 seconds @ f/16, ISO 400.

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | One comment | Updates: EOS 5D Mark II, landscapes, nature, Rock Bridge Memorial State Park

Lightning over Discovery Lake, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 5D Mark II and 24-70mm f/2.8L lens @ 30mm; exposed 6 seconds @ f/8, ISO 800.

Last week, my friends Jakob, Calin, and Jamie called me up to join them on a small lake near Discovery Parkway in Columbia, Mo. to fish.  Well, they fished.  I fished for lightning photographs.

Unfortunately, while the picture above is tack sharp, it’s not quite satisfying.  Later in the evening, I made another image that is far more pleasing–great color, great lightning strikes, including one on a cell phone tower–but is way, way out of focus when viewed at 100%.  Interestingly, when sized for this blog, it’s hard to tell that it’s soft, so I’ll share it here:

Lightning strike on the cell tower, Discovery Lake, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 5D Mark II and 24-70mm f/2.8L lens @ 43mm; exposed 2 minutes, 36 seconds @ f/8, ISO 100.

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | 2 comments | Updates: EOS 5D Mark II, landscapes, lightning, nature, pictorial

Storm over the water tower, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 5D Mark II and 70-200mm f/4L IS lens @ 135mm; exposed 10 seconds @ f/7.1, ISO 800.

Last night a line of thunderstorms tracked through Columbia, Mo., changing the hot and humid air for the better, leaving much cooler temperatures in their wake. Before the rain came, I set up my tripod on the balcony of my apartment to try to get some lightning strikes.

Lightning was plentiful, if far away–I counted out the seconds between the light and the sound, lest I be caught outside with my own personal lightning rod–but I had little to no success at capturing a bolt across the frame.

However, I did get one image that was almost surreal: the city’s water tower encircled by the light from the lightning strikes and the clouds as they sped past overhead.

I’ve added some contrast to the image, but the colors are how the camera saw them. A fun, if a bit surreal landscape.

Next time I’ll get lightning bolts.

That said, if anyone has a suggestion for how to capture them, I’m all ears!

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | One comment | Updates: EOS 5D Mark II, landscapes, nature, pictorial, weather

Incoming surf, Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, N.C. | Panasonic Lumix G1 and 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 lens @ 14mm; exposed 1/4 sec. @ f/16, ISO 100.

Incoming surf, Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, N.C. | Panasonic Lumix G1 and 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 lens @ 14mm; exposed 1/3 sec. @ f/16, ISO 100.

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | Comment! | Updates: landscapes, Lumix G1, nature

Jockey's Ridge State Park and Atlantic Ocean, Nags Head, N.C. | Panasonic Lumix G1 and Lumix 45-200mm f/4-5.6 lens @ 56mm; exposed 1/400 sec. @ f/5.6, ISO 200.

Pictorials from Vacation

Tonight, after checking in at our hotel in Manteo, N.C. on Roanoke Island, site of the “lost colony” (the first English settlement in the New World disappeared with little trace), Elizabeth and I drove over to Bodie Island.  Part of the Outer Banks, Bodie Island has some pretty interesting attractions, including the site of the Wright Brothers’ first flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C., Jockey’s Ridge State Park, which is home to the largest sand dune in the eastern United States, and the Bodie Island Lighthouse, which would normally be pretty spectacular.  Unless, of course, you get there when it’s wrapped in tarps and scaffolding.  Damn.

Bodie Island Lighthouse, Hatteras National Seashore, N.C. | Panasonic Lumix G1 and Lumix 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 lens @ 16mm; exposed 1/400 sec. @ f/5, ISO 100.

A Note about the Olympus 9-18mm

After the failure at the lighthouse, we drove back to Jockey’s Ridge State Park.  It’s a haven for people flying kites as well as hang-gliding.  Unfortunately, by the time we got there, the hang-gliding seemed to be over for the day.  However, it gave me another opportunity to experiment with the Olympus 9-18mm f/4-5.6 lens for Micro Four-Thirds.  It is a sharp  and fun little lens.  I’m not thrilled with the collapsing barrel design, which makes the lens inoperable when collapsed until you zoom out.

I think that I understand why Olympus has approached zoom lens design this way, because it does give Micro Four-Thirds lenses the (admittedly, false) appearance of being smaller than they really are.  In essence, when not in use (collapsed), it makes a nice, tidy package with their PEN cameras.  But it also makes them a bit of a pain to use.

However, shortcomings aside, it is a handy and sharp lens to have in the kit.  And considerably less expensive than Panasonic’s lens, although I would like to test theirs for a comparison.  (Hey, Panasonic: hint, hint!)

Sand dunes at Jockey's Ridge State Park, Nags Head, N.C. | Panasonic G1 and Olympus 9-18mm f/4-5.6 lens @ 9mm; exposed 1/125 sec. @ f/7.1, ISO 200.

Parting Shot

To our collective amusement, Elizabeth and I discovered, on our way back from the dunes, that the boardwalk perfectly framed a row of Pepsi vending machines to greet those who did not know how else to be welcomed back to civilization from their brief connection with nature but to drown themselves in carbonated sugar water:

A boardwalk through nature frames Pepsi Machines? Jockey's Ridge State Park, Nags Head, N.C. | Panasonic Lumix G1 and Lumix 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 lens @ 45mm; exposed 1/20 sec. @ f/5.6, ISO 200.

Content © 2010 David Kennedy | Permalink | Comment! | Updates: landscapes, Lumix G1, nature, Olympus 9-18mm, pictorial