Food and Event Photography – Mother’s Day Brunch
I took some photos of the Mother's day brunch at The El Paso Club for use on their facebook page and website. Here are some samples along with my notes on how I approached this task.
My approach involved making several passes through the event with a different focus and a different lens. Each pass would attempt to capture a different aspect of the event and the food that was being served.
Step 1: Wide Angle/Environment
I started with the 14-24mm f/2.8 lens. This lens has the ability to capture the scene in an entire room at once. The images it produces can be very dramatic or they can look cartoonish due to the wide field of view.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/8 - 1/5 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 @ 19mm
The first thing you may notice is that the people on the other side of the table are blurred. This is due to the slow shutter speed, which is a function of the aperture setting of f/8 and the amount of available light.
Because of the slow shutter speed, I had to use a tripod. Another notable setting was the use of Exposure Delay Mode which delays the exposure a bit after the mirror flips up to minimize the impact of vibration on the image.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/8 - .4 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 @ 24mm
A characteristic of this focal length is that it shows you the environment of your subject. Not only do you see the fish on the platter, you see the space behind it.
Step 2: People/Actions
The goal of the second pass was to capture service as it happened. I was looking for scenes of people getting their food, chefs making it, etc.
For this pass I used a combination of the 24-70mm f/2.8 and the 50mm f/1.4. The 24-70mm was useful to capture scenes that were happening quickly because I could adjust the focal length quickly.
Nikon D700 - ISO 2000 - f/2.8 - 1/60 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 62mm
Some notable changes to the settings during this phase are: Increased ISO to 2000, opened aperture to f/2.8, set shutter speed at 1/60. Now that I moved from using a tripod to handheld, I had to compensate for the need to have a faster shutter speed. The combination of the wider aperture and higher ISO make the faster shutter speed possible.
Nikon D700 - ISO 320 - f/2.8 - 1/60 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm
The wider aperture of f/2.8 (as compared to the first pass at f/8) allows me to control the focus of the viewer by showing them what is important while also giving a sense of context. In the photo above you see that the seafood in the foreground is the focus, but the people in the background and the hand on the right let you know that this is a real event and not just a staged photo of food.
Cropping the scene with the heads of the people in the background was intentional. Their identity is not important to the scene and they likely did not attend this event with the expectation that their face would appear in promotional items for the club.
Step 3: Details
For this step I used the 50mm f/1.4 exclusively. My goal here was to capture some of the details of the presentation at the event. I wanted to focus on an item and have everything else be blurred out. The wide aperture on the 50mm lens makes that possible.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/1.4 - 1/200 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
The shallow depth of field allows me to control what you pay attention to in the scene. Even the tray in front of the fruit is out of focus in this image shot at f/1.4. Additionally, the wider aperture allowed me to put the ISO back down to 200 and still get a shutter speed of 1/200 sec.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/1.4 - 1/100 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
The photo above is another example of how an extremely shallow DOF allows the image to communicate a sense of priority to objects while still leaving the subject in context. You know that the objects in the foreground are forks, lined up like they're ready to conquer that chocolate cake, but their shape and shiny-ness doesn't compete with the cake because they are out of focus.
Nikon D700 - ISO 2500 - f/1.4 - 1/60 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
View the entire set on The El Paso Club's Facebook page
Selected images on Flickr
Using Tonal Contrast (Clarity) on a Portrait
Tonal Contrast in Nik Software's Color Efex Pro is similar to the Clarity adjustment in Lightroom. It adjusts the image by adjusting the contrast in the three areas of shadows, midtones, and highlights. I believe the clarity adjustment in Lightroom is mostly focused on midtone contrast.
When used in a moderate to heavy way, this adjustment has the potential to make an image almost HDR-like. This is why I frequently use this adjustment on landscape images.
I had never considered using it on a portrait until I shot the image below.
The texture in the brick is a little flat and boring. I wanted to see if adding some midtone contrast would help.
I was really pleased with the results. The bricks on the wall and ground have much more texture to them. The subject's hair now has more highlights and the photo has a much better feeling of depth.
I think I'll be using this adjustment much more frequently in the future.
High School Senior Portrait Session
Here are a few photos from a recent shoot with a high school senior.
We started out in the studio with some traditional cap and gown portraits.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/8 - 1/160 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
Lighting was as follows:
- Key: Rectangular soft box camera right
- Fill: Umbrella camera left and high - closer to the side of the subject.
- Background: Gelled flash behind subject
All triggered using the Cactus V5 system.
After the formal photos were out of the way we had a little fun with the subject and his guitar. Here is one of the more dramatic photos.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/8 - 1/160 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
Lighting was similar to the first portrait except the gel on the background flash was switched to a deep brown. If I had the chance to do this again, I would have added a light for his hair and I would have ironed the backdrop.
For the second part of the session we met downtown to get some more creative shots.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/3.2 - 1/200 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 120mm
Lighting for this shot was an umbrella camera right. The sun to the right of the frame and near the horizon, so it provided good edge lighting as you can see in the subject's hair. The difficulty I had with this shot was controlling the reflection from the flash coming off the body of the guitar.
As the sun was setting we moved toward a nice brick wall.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/3.2 - 1/200 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 90mm
The light here is a combination of natural sunlight masked by a tree with a flash in an umbrella camera left. This scenario caused two different colors of light, but I think the effect is nice. If I had to do it over again, I'd probably try using a gold umbrella instead of a white one.
Overall, I think the session went well and we got some good photos for the student and his family.
Downtown El Paso at Night from the Roof of City Hall
Have you seen this photo?
I was starting to notice the same old photo of downtown El Paso on various websites and on email newsletters. While I thought it was a flattering image of downtown El Paso, it is obvious that it is very old and it has become distorted along the way. I decided that I wanted to recreate this photo.
The first task was determining where it was taken from. It's obviously from a high vantage point above most of the buildings. By looking at the arrangement of the buildings as well as considering the building that is missing, it became obvious that the photo was taken from the roof of City Hall.
The next task was getting permission to access the roof one evening to take the photo. That turned out to be easier than I expected. A few emails between me and a few people at the city yielded the permission I needed.
I watched the weather for a few days and picked a day that had high potential for low winds. Clear skies or partly cloudy skies would be ideal as well. I invited my coworker, Tony Casas to come along for the adventure.
In the equipment department, I packed everything I had. My plan was to run two cameras at the same time so I could double my potential number of exposures.
We arrived at City Hall at about 6:40 and were promptly greeted by the security guards as we had been instructed. One of them quickly showed us to the roof access door and left us. When we got to the roof, we examined the various potential locations from where we could shoot. One unexpected kink in the plan was the height of the wall that surrounds the roof. It was taller than 2 of our 3 tripods. We were able to find a way to use the window-washer mounting posts to boost the height of our tripods. For me, this meant my camera was higher than my head - which presented a challenge with camera operation.
Tony took this photo of me. I never looked down.
You can see from the photo above that there is no way for me to see through the viewfinder. This was the first time I've ever used the live view feature. It took me a little while to figure out how to get it to display all the information I needed.
Because of the difficulty we had getting our tripods set-up and the breeze, I decided that I wouldn't use my second camera. I didn't want to see the wind knock it over and watch it crash to the ground 12 floors below.
In addition to recreating the photo at the top of this post, I wanted to capture some panoramic images. This required that the camera was as level as possible so the resulting images would be straight. I found the virtual horizon feature on the D700 useful, but not critical.
As we waited for the sun to get closer to the horizon I took a few photos to check framing and exposure.
There are three potential shooting times during this time of the day (names I made up based on the color):
- Gold
- Blue
- Black
For each of these periods my goal was to shoot one wide, one tight, and one panoramic image. The required exposure times dramatically increase during the late part of the Blue period and during the Black period. My original plan was to use two cameras during this time to capture more photos, but the wind and tripod difficulties made me scratch that plan.
Gold
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 1/80 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 27mm
I found that the 24-70mm lens gave me the appropriate range of field of view to create wide as well as tight pictures.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/8 - 1/80 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm
I selected a spot on the roof that would allow me to see a significant amount of the County County Courthouse. The tradeoff was the Abraham Chavez Theater would be more difficult to include in the images.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 1/60 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 32mm
Cylindrical Projection
Each of the panoramic shots is a series of 3 to 6 images stitched together using Hugin. With images with this wide of a field of view there are tradeoffs. The image above uses a Cylindrical Projection method that keeps buildings in proportion at the expense of horizontal lines. Notice how San Francisco Street curves near the edges of the image.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 1/60 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 32mm
Rectilinear Projection
The Rectilinear Projection above keeps the horizontal lines straight at the expense of significant distortion in the buildings. Notice the difference in the width of the Camino Real hotel.
Gold to Blue
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 2 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 29mm
Just after the sun sets the sky begins to turn darker blue. Sometimes light shades of pink and orange appear as well. This is the time just before the street lights turn on.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/13 - 1.6 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm
Blue
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 10 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm
As the sky becomes darker and more artificial lights turn on, the scene really begins to become dramatic. The longer exposure that is required also creates some interesting light streaks from the passing vehicles.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 8 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 35mm
Cylindrical Projection
Blue to Black
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 15 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 26mm
As the sky darkens, deep blue is replaced with purple. Artificial lights take over as the primary light source which creates a challenge for getting proper white balance and exposure.
Black
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 20 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm
The final shots of the night show a nearly completely black sky and almost 100% artificial lighting on structures.
Purchase digital images from El Paso Stock Photos
Photography Lessons from a Middle School Track Meet
Here are my photography notes from my daughter's recent track meet. I used the opportunity to test a few techniques that I had used in the past as well as some new ones.
Key techniques:
- Pre-set Focus
- Manual Exposure
- Continuous Shutter Release
- Composition
The first event I photographed was high jump. The peak of the action in this event happens in one location, so this is a great opportunity to practice pre-setting the focus point.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/2.8 - 1/3200 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm
The photo above was taken by pre-setting the focus point on the center of the bar. I use a technique called "Back Button Focus" to separate the activation of auto-focus from the press of the shutter. This lets me pre-set the focus and know that it won't change when I press the shutter release. Without this technique, the camera would likely have gotten confused and focused on the viewing stands behind the action.
The second challenge in the photo above is getting the exposure correct. Normally, I would use spot metering in aperture priority mode so the camera would adjust the shutter speed as it feels necessary. I use spot metering because I find that it eliminates some issues when scenes are back-lit as the viewing stands effectively do in the photo above. However, because the scene is very high contrast - from the black of the track to the white of the viewing stands, I found it best to use manual exposure. I found that the gray on the mat was very close to 18% gray, so I spot metered the mat while I set the exposure. I found somewhere between 1/2500 and 1/3200 with an aperture between f/2.8 and f/3.2 produced well exposed images.
The final challenge in the photo above is catching the action. I found that the best way to catch the action was to take advantage of the "Continuous High" shutter release mode on the camera. My configuration lets me take up to 8 shots per second when the shutter release button is pressed. I would watch through the viewfinder and hold the shutter down as soon as I saw the subject enter the frame.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/3.2 - 1/2500 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm
Another challenge I wanted to try was to vary the composition of the photos. I did this in two ways. First, as is obvious in the photo above, I took some vertical shots of this event. I like the fact that the vertical shots show the entire story from the ground to the sky. Also, as you can tell from the very bottom of the image above, I was very low when I took this photo - I was actually sitting on the ground. I've found that sports photos taken from low positions tend to give the best results.
Another aspect of composition is the viewing angle from which I took the pictures. Looking at the two photos above, you can see that I moved more toward the side of the event for the second photo. I like the perspective the second position gives the photo. I took a few other photos from behind the front edge of the mat as well.
1600 Meter Relay
The next event that provided a learning experience was the 1600 Meter Relay. Unlike the high jump, the location of the action is not known in advance, so the pre-focus technique will not work here. Using Back Button Focus, I was able to press the AF-ON button continuously during the photos below to ensure that the camera maintained a focus lock as the subject was moving.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/3.2 - 1/1600 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm
As with the High Jump photos, manual exposure worked best because of the potential for automatic exposure to be tricked by the wide amount of contrast in the scene.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/3.2 - 1/2500 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm
There was a fence around this portion of the track so I couldn't get low to the ground like I would have wanted. I did, however, vary my composition to create the image above. I always have to force myself to give the subject room in the composition. I tend to want to capture as much detail of the subject as possible, so that means I try to always zoom tight. A photo like the one above is more about telling a story than conveying detail. The empty space in front of the subject gives you an idea that she has a place to go - a path ahead.
Dramatic Prom Photos
My son recently escorted a friend to her school's prom. Before he left to meet her we spent a few minutes taking pictures. I wanted to see what I could do with a black background and a few lights to get a dramatic effect.
To get the dramatic effect I use the lighting as displayed below:
The lighting plan consisted of a large soft box for key light and two bare lights for rim lighting. One bare bulb was on a stand behind the backdrop aimed down at the subject's head. The other was on a stand directly to the left of the subject. The first few shots I took didn't have the benefit of the second rim light and I found that this caused the black tuxedo to get lost in the background. Once I added the second rim light on the side, the edges of the tuxedo became visible.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/6.3 - 1/160 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/6.3 - 1/160 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
After I reviewed the image above I decided that it would have been a good idea to soften the left rim light a bit. There is an obvious harsh shadow from his shoulder across the lower portion of his jaw. An umbrella or other diffuser would have prevented this issue.
Three Month Baby Session
Here are some photos from a session with a three-month old baby. The weather was nice and the grass was turning green so we decided to do this session outside.
Initially, I wanted to use the Nikon 50mm f/1.4, but I wasn't able to get the background to look the way I wanted. I switched to the 70-200 f/2.8 and used it near the 200mm focal length. In the future I want to do a post that shows the impact of focal lengths on depth of field and the often-discussed concept of compression due to focal length.
For now, here are some of the pictures I was able to get with the 70-200.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/2.8 - 1/250 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 170mm
Lighting was a large soft-box above and to the left of the subject in addition to ambient sunlight. Photos were taken in the shade.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/2.8 - 1/250 sec.
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm
The long focal length combined with the wide open aperture provided a very pleasing shallow depth of field that resulted in the background being completely blurred. If this had not been the case, the pathway, gravel, and rock wall behind the subject would have been very distracting in the image.
Product Photography
I purchased a Photo Studio Soft Box Lighting Tent to make it easier for me to take pictures of stationary objects. The light diffusion characteristics of these devices make it possible to take a photo of an object without any shadows.
Shortly after I figured out how to set it up I was able to take very interesting photos like this one:
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/2.8 - 1/200 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 @ 20mm
The goal of shots like this is to make the background disappear into 100% white, black, or another color. Even with this set-up, I found that it was a challenge to accomplish this goal. The problem is the sharpness of the photo picks up the grain of the backdrop where it meets the object. It is important to have a clear intersection because, even with bright lighting, it's difficult to get the background to be 100% of any color at full consistency. This means the photo will likely require some manipulation to fully white-out the background - and clear edges are critical in this process.
The photo above is immune to this issue because the intersection of the object and the surface is out of focus.
To make this easier, I used a clear piece of plexiglass with a white piece of paper under it. This left me with some visible lines, but those are easy to remove.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/10 - 1/250 sec.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
The photo above required a clear line where the flower pot contacted the surface. The plexiglass and paper solution worked well, but it still wasn't perfect. Careful masking in an image editor was required to clean up the edges of the object.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/6.3 - 1/200 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm
For the image above, total isolation was not the goal because the object extended beyond the frame of the image.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/11 - 1/250 sec.
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm
The image above was a challenge because the pennies were creating a reflection and a shadow on the plexiglass. Also, I found that the final image needed some amount of shadow to look real. I adjusted the lighting to be less diffused and softer. I also had to spend quite a bit of time modifying the final image to remove the reflection and smooth out the shadows. Even with the glass under the pennies I was able to see the grain of the paper in the final image. I selected the shadows and blurred them a bit to get rid of this problem.
All of the photos in this post are available on my iStock portfolio.
Photography Lessons from the Monster Truck Show
My family and I went to the annual Monster Truck Show in Sun Bowl Stadium. We've attended this event each year for as long as I can remember, but this is the first time I brought my camera to the show.
Equipment Choice
I decided to bring the Nikon D90 and 18-200 lens because I didn't want to lug the larger camera body and lens and I wasn't anticipating taking any photos that would be for anything other than personal use. This combination introduced a few challenges that I wouldn't have had if I had brought my better equipment.
Challenge #1 - Getting Proper Exposure
The lighting conditions at the stadium were very complex. The range from dark to light was present in very close proximity. The trucks themselves had many black components as well as reflective surfaces that would become very bright at certain times. This type of scene can cause the camera's metering system to produce very inconsistent results. This problem is amplified if you shoot in spot metering mode because whatever you are focusing on will be metered and the rest of the scene be affected by that single point.
When I have found myself in this situation in the past, I would evaluate the lighting in the room by pointing the spot meter point at various light and dark spots and then choose a manual exposure setting that will work well under the conditions. Minor adjustments can be made from that base setting and I don't run the risk of a stage light catching the meter's attention and throwing everything to black.
In this case, however, I had the 18-200 lens, which is not constant aperture throughout the zoom range. This means as focal length was changed, aperture would also change, making it necessary to adjust exposure. It is possible to just set the aperture at f/5.6, which is the widest setting at the longest focal length, but that would have caused my photos taken at shorter focal lengths to not take advantage of the widest available aperture of f/3.5. In this dark setting, I needed all the light I could get.
Solution - AE Lock and Auto ISO
I have my D90 configured so that the AE/AF Lock button acts like the AF-ON button on my D700. This means that pressing the shutter does not activate the auto-focus system. When the shutter is pressed half way, the exposure is locked based on the current scene and metering mode. In this case, I found that locking the exposure based on the dirt on the field gave good results.
Another challenge related to exposure is getting a shutter speed that is fast enough to freeze a moving vehicle while still letting enough light in for proper exposure. On my camera, I have the option to allow the ISO to automatically increase in order to get a minimum specified shutter speed. This means that the camera will shoot at the configured ISO and only increase it if is necessary to get a shutter speed that I specified - up to a maximum ISO. The setting that I found worked well was a minimum shutter speed around 1/200 with a maximum ISO of 3200.
Professional photographers will cringe at suggestion of the use of Auto ISO - but this scenario is not about getting publication-quality photos - in this case, Auto ISO is a tool worth using.
Challenge #2 - Timing
This type of live event can have unexpected events. I hadn't fully considered this until I missed a few photo opportunities. I was focusing on catching the trucks as they jumped into the air, attempting to frame the trucks in a way that showed how high they were flying. Having attended these events for many years I should have already known that it's when the truck lands that can give the most spectacular scenes. I'm not sure why that didn't immediately click in my mind, but it became reality when I missed the first crash on landing - and it was the headliner truck.
Solution - Keep Shooting
After I realized this, I made an effort to photograph not only the jumps, but also the landings - and any potential impact with anything on the field. This resulted in many photos that were nothing special, but it was better to catch a few crash landings and have lots of images to delete than to miss all the crash landings.
Challenge #3 - Stationary Position
Because I attended the event as a spectator and not as a photographer, I had no ability to move around the venue to get different angles. This is quite limiting, but not a deal breaker.
Solution - Vary Composition
Although I couldn't vary my position, I had full control over composition. The 18-200 lens provides a very wide range of focal lengths. I also used different composition techniques to vary the placement of the primary subject and framing elements.
Challenge #4 - Composition
I took the opportunity of being limited in my position to work on my composition skills. Some of the techniques I used in conjunction with the rule of thirds were - "where is it going?" and "where did it come from?" - with these techniques, the primary subject is placed on one of the intersections of the rule of thirds lines with the path of motion in front of or behind the subject.
Another composition challenge was the relationship between foreground, middle-ground, and background. During the first portion of the show I found myself putting the subject near the bottom of the frame in an attempt to have the audience serve as the background. Later in the show, as the trucks jumped higher, I took a few shots with the subject near the top of the frame. I found that this gave much more dramatic impact in showing just how high the trucks were jumping.
 |
 |
|
| Poor Composition Viewer has no idea how high the truck is |
Better Composition Viewer can see the ground as reference point |
Challenge #5 - White Balance
When I previewed some of the images on the camera's screen, I noticed that they looked pale and a bit blue - an obvious problem with the white balance chosen by the camera. Because I shoot in RAW mode, changing the white balance later is no problem at all.
When I processed the images in Capture NX 2 I adjusted the white balance until I found something that looked pleasing and as I remembered it. The setting was somewhere near daylight, but more on the cool side.
Once I found the right value, applying it to all the files was simple.
Walking Around Downtown El Paso at Night
On January 30, 2011 I spent a few minutes walking around downtown El Paso with my camera and a tripod. Many of the buildings have very interesting architectural features that are accented by the way they are lit at night.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/13 - 8 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 at 18mm
I stuck to one lens the entire night - the Nikon 14-24 f/2.8. This lens allowed me to capture very wide pictures with very interesting perspective. For the shot above, I waited until a city bus was about to pass through the scene. I would have been happier with a little more effect from the bus, but I think it adds an interesting element of motion regardless.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/16 - 30 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 at 14mm
The shot above was taken using a technique I've never tried before. I set the camera for a 30 second exposure and used my SB-700 flash to light the statue. I hit the flash twice from each side of the camera, about 5 feet left and right.
After seeing the result I think I could have done better if I had flashed the statue more times from more angles. Maybe next time I'll walk around in a semi-circle hitting the flash every few seconds.
Nikon D700 - ISO 200 - f/16 - 4 sec. and 13 sec.
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 at 22mm
The shot above is a merge of two exposures in order to compress the dynamic range. I wanted to capture the brick pattern and the interesting shadows cast by the entryway lighting, but the amount of light at the entrance was significantly greater than the amount of light hitting the rest of the building. I took my two exposures, not really planning to do anything but choose the best one. When I looked at the images I determined that a little HDR merging would do the photo well. I imported the files into HDR Efex Pro and adjusted the settings until I achieved a nice range of contrast without too much of an HDR appearance.
View the rest of the photos on Flickr
Archive
Categories
- Culture (25)
- Economics (52)
- Local (19)
- Photography (62)
- Politics (59)
- Seriously? (30)
- Tips (4)
Photography
Social
Flickr
- Poppies in Northeast El Paso - http://t.co/YFtP7VEb
- The Rio (Not-So) Grande - http://t.co/JLUzMC5D
- Photography Lessons from the Monster Truck Show: http://t.co/b6cSwyOz