Common Sense and Whiskey

Wednesday HDR - Across the Tiber River, Before and After

Here's an example of turning a typically dreadful tourist snapshot into something you might hang on to.

You can't help the weather, and this was a pleasant enough day, but with a high overcast that washed out colors.

I'm always snapping away (ask Mirja) and if there's a body of water I'll be shooting across it. In this case, it's the Tiber River near the Vatican. It's one of those shots you skip through on your computer, and never look at again. But with a lot of spare time over the next winter, I went back to see if any of those Italy shots were salvageable.

You start by re-exposing the camera raw original + and - several stops. Then save each as a tiff, and then combine and process to suit you in Photomatix, and finish in Photoshop with the help of Nik filters. Up close, it looks like I used a tree bark texture over the whole thing, too. The result? Well, it beats the original:

Click the photos to A/B larger versions. There are 390 HDRs in the HDR Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.

Ships - Wednesday HDRs

Ships, top to bottom, from the dockyards at Fremantle, Australia, The Ortakoy Mosque and the Bosphorus Bridge, Istanbul, Turkey, the Mekong Delta near Saigon, Vietnam, and Stockholm, Sweden. Click them to make them bigger. There's a little story about that Mekong Delta boat ride here.

All these HDRs are shot with Nikon cameras, combined in Photomatix, finished in Photoshop, some with Nik filters.

Wildlife - Wednesday HDR

The hippo family lives along the Kazinga Channel and the colobus monkey somewhere alongside the road, both in Uganda, the horses are from rural Finland, the eagle from the Munich Tierpark Hellabrunn Zoo and the parrots from Antigua, Guatemala. All processed in Photomatix and Photoshop. Click 'em to make them bigger. More HDRs here.

Wednesday HDRs from Malawi

For me, Malawi was a feel good place, and I think these photos show it. Happy people, agreeable, gentle pace of life. Later this week we'll publish Chapter 14 from Common Sense and Whiskey - the book (Amazon, BN,  Kindle - Kindle's just $4.99) here on the blog. It's the story of our crossing Lake Malawi on the legendary passenger ship the MV Ilala.

These photos are both re-exposed nine times and recombined in Photomatix, finished in CS5 with Nik filters. There are 384 more HDRs in the HDR Gallery at EarthPhotos.com. Click these two to make them much bigger.

 

Churches - Wednesday HDRs

It's gotten to be a little project lately. Anytime we're visiting somewhere new I try to pop into a local church and get enough shots to put together an HDR photo. Since churches aren't places to be big and brash and American, coming in, taking over and spreading out with a tripod, these usually have to be hand held brackets and some are more successful than others. They all seem to require substantial processing.

Here are some from a few of our last trips. Click them all to make them bigger. They're from Havana, Cuba, St. Helena Island, Panama City, Panama and Riga, Latvia.

See them all, along with 380 other HDRs in the HDR Gallery at EarthPhotos.com. And if any of them catches your fancy you can see more photos in the Cuba, St. Helena, Panama and Latvia galleries. All these were shot with Nikon cameras, processed in Photomatix with various Nik plug-ins and finished in Photoshop.

 

Antique Trains - More Wednesday HDRs from Havana

It's not just old cars that Havana's famous for. Check out these trains. Click 'em to make 'em much bigger, and see all the Cuba photos at Earthphotos.com.

A Catholic Wednesday HDR

Il Papa is in Havana today to celebrate mass at Revolución Square in the Vedado neighborhood outside downtown. Revolución Square is dominated by a graceless 358 foot tall monument to Cuban independence hero Jose Marti. It's safe to say that the Catedral de la Virgen María de la Concepción Inmaculada de La Habana on Cathedral Square is a lot prettier.

Click it to make it much bigger. From the Cuba Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.

Stuck in the Sixties - Wednesday HDRs from Havana

These Havana photos have been a lot of fun to work on. Click each to make them bigger. There are three dozen photos up now in the Cuba Gallery at EarthPhotos.com. Probably will be another dozen or so. See also the HDR Gallery.

Wednesday HDR - Back from Havana Version

There's just about no internet in Cuba. No internet cafés, no internet in private homes. There's slow internet in hotel public areas, but we opted not to spend the time squeezing photos through the wires, so we have lots to catch up on about Cuba.

And there's lots to say, but I'd rather not be hasty. I want to let all our impressions steep for a few days before I make my inevitable brash and presumptious generalizations about the lot of the Cuban people. It'll come, over time.

For today, here's one of the first photos I've posted to the new Cuba Gallery at EarthPhotos.com. Keep an eye on that gallery. It'll grow steadily over the next few weeks.

We've all heard there are old cars like this in Hanava. What's surprising is how many there are - just hundreds upon hundreds. Many, many more than I expected. Click this photo to get a much bigger version.

This shot comes from multiple exposures of a single RAW, shot with a Nikon D-700, combined in Photomatix & finished in CS5 with Nik tools, including my new favorite, Viveza 2. If you like this, you might check out 365 other HDRs in theEarthPhotos.com HDR Gallery.

Just Back from Cuba. Photos Coming....

Click it to make it bigger.

Wednesday HDR - En Route to Miami Version

As we head south today, I leave you with an HDR I cooked up one rainy cold winter day, in front of the wood stove at the studio. This one is from somewhere up on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo.

Shot with a Nikon D-700, processed with PhotoMatix, Nik filters and Photoshop CS5. And a texture added. Click to make it much bigger. And see 365 more HDR photos here, at EarthPhotos.com.

Ethiopian Street Life - Wednesday HDRs

HDRs from a trip to the Mercado open air market in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. All shot with a Nikon D-700, processed with PhotoMatix, Nik filters and Photoshop CS5. Click 'em to make them much bigger. And see 360 more HDR photos here, at EarthPhotos.com.

Taksim Square, Istanbul - Wednesday HDR

If you click this photo you can see a much bigger version, which is good because there's a lot to see - all the little people and the yellow cabs around Taksim Square, the Galata Tower further on down toward the Golden Horn and the Sea of Marmara in the background.  Just a few of the countless things that make Istanbul one of my top five world cities.*

It's a confluence of civilization, continents and cultures in a breathtaking physical setting. For a kid from the American south, the sound of the call to prayer from all different directions at dusk is hopelessly exotic. Istanbul. What's not to like?

More photos from several trips to Istanbul and Turkey here, and more HDRs here on EarthPhotos.com.

* My top five list: Hong Kong, Istanbul, Paris, San Fransisco, Sydney. Your results may vary.

Rainy Wednesday HDR

The Wednesday HDR this week is the much swollen Mekong River during the rainy season, upstream from Saigon, Vietnam. I wrote this little story about the trip at the time.

Click the photo to make it bigger. This photo comes from multiple exposures of a single RAW, shot with a Nikon D-700, combined in Photomatix & finished in CS5 with Nik tools. There are 355 more HDRs here and 385 more photos in the Vietnam Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.

The Katherine Gorge, Australia's Northern Territory - Wednesday HDR

Here's the photogenic Katherine Gorge in Australia's Northern Territory. There was about a half day stop on the Ghan train between Darwin and Adelaide, and the only way to get in in that amount of time was with a kind of paddle boat thing with twenty or so others.

With a little determination, you could get out ahead of the others in time to set your tripod down and fire off a few photos without getting Phil and Marge from Brisbane in the picture.

As usual, it's multiple shots with a Nikon D-700, combined in Photomatix, finished with Nik plug-ins and CS5.

There are 354 more HDRs here and 405 more from Australia here at EarthPhotos.com.

 

The Vatican, Rome - Wednesday HDR

 

Here's an HDR combined from three exposures, not exactly hand held, but propped up on the wall at the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome. That's the Tiber River on the left, and the dome in the background, center, is the Vatican. Click it to make it bigger.

There are 354 more HDRs here at EarthPhotos.com.

Shot with a Nikon D-700, made HDR in Photomatix, finished with Nik plug-ins and CS5.

Helsinki - Wednesday HDR

I don't know, I just thought Vatican was a pretty funny name for a café bar nightclub. This was three bracketed handheld shots with a Nikon D-700, combined in Photomatix & finished in CS5 with Nik tools.

There are 352 more HDRs here at EarthPhotos.com.

Wednesday HDR - Big, Huge, Massive, Get Out of the Way Bank

I don't know, it was just funny. In lots of places, a big bank like this one in Helsinki probably suggests safety and stability. But in the U.S., with all our bailed out too-big-to-fail financial institutions, mortgage lenders, car companies, you name it, it plays a little differently.

This particular Big Bank, on Salomonkatu in the Kamppi section of Helsinki, was shut tight on a Saturday in these photos. The top HDR was processed from three hand held bracketed shots, and the other is from a single RAW re-exposed and bracketed several times, both photos processed with Photomatix, Nik and Photoshop CS5.

There are almost 350 HDR shots in the HDR Gallery and also check out the Finland Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.

HDR Goes Mainstream

Those of us who have used HDR processing for some time will not miss that this photo is clearly a result of tonemapping. But that's not mentioned where we see it, in an article in the New York Times. So nowadays, HDR tonemapping goes unremarked....

The photo accompanies the article Buliding a Better Mitt Romney-Bot in the New York Times. Compare it's arty feel to this photo I took and converted to HDR from Sydney, Australia:

The notable thing is that the NYT doesn't mention that their photo is HDR. Photo manipulation isn't new in journalism. Apparently, HDR techniques need not be disclosed nowadays, either.

Mt. Cotopaxi and Quito, Ecuador - Wednesday HDR

HDR photo of 19,347 foot (5897 meter) Mt. Cotopaxi and Quito, Ecuador, with texture. Images combined and tonemapped in Photomatix, and finished in Photoshop. Click to enlarge.

In case you're new to textures, here (1, 2) are a couple of compilations of tutorials. You'll have to poke through them a little bit, but there are some good things to be learned. Here's a great collection of free textures I sometimes use.

But the best way to create textures is to go out and shoot some and blend them with your photo. Famous HDR proponent Trey Ratcliff will sell you textures and advice for $100 - $400, but there's no need for that. Just go out and shoot your own, and experiment.

See hundreds more HDRs in the HDR Gallery and lots more of Ecuador in the Ecuador Gallery at EarthPhotos.com.