229/365
A 365 project first for me, which I am not entirely sure I should be ashamed or inspired. Today was a blah day, until one of my friends decided that he wanted to meet up and shoot some pictures around town. Now while thats all hunky dory, he wanted to go to the UW-Arboretum: with the rains and excessive humidity we have had recently I gave him plenty of warning that the bugs would be bad. He ignored my warning and we met up, thankfully he brought insect spray for I have none myself. We trekked through the woods stirring up plenty of bugs, mosquitos were the main concern and they definately made their presence known. Within ten minutes of walking, we stopped in the path to snap a few frames of some mushrooms growing in a neat pattern along the trunk of a slowly dying tree. This was quite the mistake; as we walked closer the tree a swarm of at least two dozen mosquitos came from underneath and started to attack us. We ran from the tree, and back to the path waving our tripods in the air to battle these blood sucking bastards. Eventually we gave in and decided that we would find the way back to our cars, and venture somewhere the bugs had not infested the surroundings with the intent of eating us alive.
We agreed to meet off Bedford for it was free parking, for at least two hours anyway: Also far enough from the majority of the craziness of move-in weekend on campus. I took what I thought would be the easiest way down, which turned out to be a series of unfortunately events. Turns out a train bad back up along the North Shore corridor and at that North Shore was my route to Bedford. Driving aimlessly, I found myself squirming with an upset stomach and decided to just find my way home. Once home I proceeded to take a nap, for three hours: being excessive lazy or maybe just not able to catch up on sleep from the previous nights accounts of being up til 3a.m. I am not entirely sure which one it was.
The light was still overcast, a dark ominus gray covered the sky and I figured there wasnt much going to happen for a sunset but I drove West anyway. Struggling to find a nice vantage point over the main highway to the West, I pulled my car off the road and walked to an overpass and started shooting. Trying all sorts of lenses to see what I could pull into the frame or select FROM the frame that was the most enjoyable for my eyes. As it turns out the skys dull red started to fade, into a multi-tude of blues, grays, and reds. My 18mm was the onlens thatt I could find that was able to capture a good portion of the image, which leads me to the confession.
Tonights image is a first for me, a panoramic: now maybe you read the stories or maybe just look at the tags, or simply just the picture. But this for me is as ground breaking as was when I broke down last summer and cropped an image. Something I swear by that Id never do in my project, as it breaks the rules via POD "picure of the day," should really only be ONE frame. But alas my friend Brian helped me break down and realize that if I wanted a winner shot to remember today by, it was definately the pano. These two shots are seemed together with Adobe Photoshop Elements 7, seemlessly a SOOC: but there was a slight contrast adjust with the right side. We debated back and forth for a good 30 minutes if it was the clouds or a slight change in exposure, until I managed to get the right adjust on the contrast. The only way that I could have done this shot without having to do a pano was if I had a full frame sensor and had used my 18mm for one shot vs two, but heck sometimes the cheaper alternative wins.
229/365
A 365 project first for me, which I am not entirely sure I should be ashamed or inspired. Today was a blah day, until one of my friends decided that he wanted to meet up and shoot some pictures around town. Now while thats all hunky dory, he wanted to go to the UW-Arboretum: with the rains and excessive humidity we have had recently I gave him plenty of warning that the bugs would be bad. He ignored my warning and we met up, thankfully he brought insect spray for I have none myself. We trekked through the woods stirring up plenty of bugs, mosquitos were the main concern and they definately made their presence known. Within ten minutes of walking, we stopped in the path to snap a few frames of some mushrooms growing in a neat pattern along the trunk of a slowly dying tree. This was quite the mistake; as we walked closer the tree a swarm of at least two dozen mosquitos came from underneath and started to attack us. We ran from the tree, and back to the path waving our tripods in the air to battle these blood sucking bastards. Eventually we gave in and decided that we would find the way back to our cars, and venture somewhere the bugs had not infested the surroundings with the intent of eating us alive.
We agreed to meet off Bedford for it was free parking, for at least two hours anyway: Also far enough from the majority of the craziness of move-in weekend on campus. I took what I thought would be the easiest way down, which turned out to be a series of unfortunately events. Turns out a train bad back up along the North Shore corridor and at that North Shore was my route to Bedford. Driving aimlessly, I found myself squirming with an upset stomach and decided to just find my way home. Once home I proceeded to take a nap, for three hours: being excessive lazy or maybe just not able to catch up on sleep from the previous nights accounts of being up til 3a.m. I am not entirely sure which one it was.
The light was still overcast, a dark ominus gray covered the sky and I figured there wasnt much going to happen for a sunset but I drove West anyway. Struggling to find a nice vantage point over the main highway to the West, I pulled my car off the road and walked to an overpass and started shooting. Trying all sorts of lenses to see what I could pull into the frame or select FROM the frame that was the most enjoyable for my eyes. As it turns out the skys dull red started to fade, into a multi-tude of blues, grays, and reds. My 18mm was the onlens thatt I could find that was able to capture a good portion of the image, which leads me to the confession.
Tonights image is a first for me, a panoramic: now maybe you read the stories or maybe just look at the tags, or simply just the picture. But this for me is as ground breaking as was when I broke down last summer and cropped an image. Something I swear by that Id never do in my project, as it breaks the rules via POD "picure of the day," should really only be ONE frame. But alas my friend Brian helped me break down and realize that if I wanted a winner shot to remember today by, it was definately the pano. These two shots are seemed together with Adobe Photoshop Elements 7, seemlessly a SOOC: but there was a slight contrast adjust with the right side. We debated back and forth for a good 30 minutes if it was the clouds or a slight change in exposure, until I managed to get the right adjust on the contrast. The only way that I could have done this shot without having to do a pano was if I had a full frame sensor and had used my 18mm for one shot vs two, but heck sometimes the cheaper alternative wins.