View allAll Photos Tagged skillset
Tra & Battlecat look for new career paths...those with limited skillsets...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjizt4Ixt6E&list=RDgH_2W6M7NN...
Stuff
[ContraptioN] Play's Shako FREE GROUP GIFT
L'Emporio&PL::*The Tube*
[The Forge] Welding Goggles Steel
PFC~Raven Pauldron
DE Designs - Halter Laceup Corset
*BLITZED* Marauder Armband
[ht:apparel] shinguard
(CAT) Remarkable Oblivion Gas Mask
DRD Motor Gloves
Pix'd @ Beautiful Tralala's Diner @ Pine Lake
Post-apoc living at it's finest
I've always thought climbing mountains in the summer was within my skillset... but going up them in the winter in conditions like this where specialist knowledge and equipment is needed is defo beyond me. They look foreboding and dangerous places... yet they prob hold the most beauty at that time of year. When I was younger I climbed a fair few of Scotlands more accessible Munro's and I do have a want to climb more... but not in winter and not by myself with little experience. I have a real love and appreciation for these places I want to take photographs of them... but I also have a respect for them and beauty could also quickly become a place like hell if the conditions change! I'll continue to shoot them in winter from afar or from the lower slopes.
My mountain whitterings where brought on by a post I seen today on twitter from the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team... They where simply saying a merry Christmas and stay safe... I hope people take heed of this message and don't spoil the teams Christmas dinner being called out to save a fool!
M16 is an emission nebula in the Serpens constellation, around 7000 light years from earth.
I actually captured this data during the year of which we do not speak (2020). Since then, my processing skillset has improved quite a bit, so I felt a reprocess was in order. Overall, quite happy with the result.
The area is most "famous" because of the elongated structures throughout (the iconic "pillars of creation" imaged by the Hubble telescope). So what's going on there?
The reason for these structures to appear is twofold:
1) Material in those areas is so dense that it starts to collapse in on itself (by itself, we mean the core region). This is essentially what causes new stars to be formed within.
2) Because of the presence of these stars, a process called "photoevaporation" occurs. This quite simply means that radiation from those newly formed stars is blowing the structure apart from the inside. Only the densest areas are able to hold so to speak, while the outer areas are being blown away. As a result, you end up with a very distinct almost carved out looking dense structure.
Image acquisition details:
25x300" HA
25x300" OIII
25x300" SII
This concludes my series I've been posting for the last 3 months taking place at Quoted Memories. I want to give a huge, giant thank you to Elfi Siemens for creating this beautiful sim and supporting my work, you and I have never conversed but I'd love to get to know you one day and thank you personally for making this beautiful, inspiring place. This will not be the last shot I post from here, I'll post my outtakes later, and will continue to shoot more things here as the ideas come, this is just the end of the set and the mini-story I was telling.
Also thank you to all of you who have supported my work the last few months, I felt really inspired while shooting this set and your favs and especially your comments of encouragement mean the world to me. I feel like doing the last two sets have changed me and elevated my skillset, and I look forward to seeing what I stumble onto next.
Lastly, it's mental health awareness month, and I wanted to put it out there that the last few months of my posts have been related to this and helping people see you can go from a negative space to a positive one with the right mindset and mentality. Take care of yourselves, in the end you'll always be your own strongest support system, and do the things that make you happy in life no matter what other people think about you.
Taken at Quoted Memories.
One of my attempts at the "Macro Mondays" theme "Fruit".
The lens I shot this with was sold as 'broken/for parts' because firstly it looks like it fell out of some machine, without any sort of casing, proper inscription or aperture markings and secondly because the aperture wasn't working. Even for someone like me (with a very limited skillset in terms of crafting/repairing things) it was relatively easy to fix that issue.
Now it's one of my all-time favorite lenses!
Shot with an Agfa "M 3525 6/3" lens on a Canon EOS R5.
Our very first visit to an International Dark Sky Park and the experience still left us in awe!
I recognize fully that this photo is a joke to all the astrophotographers out there! 😏
This was just a fun experience for me - been there, and done that!
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"My god, it's full of stars" is a phrase associated with a scene from the 1968 Stanley Kubrick film "2001: A Space Odyssey" in which the protagonist David Bowman is traveling through the star gate created by the monolith orbiting Jupiter and the awed expression face that he gives.
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Thank you for not laughing at my lack of skillset in this genre!
PS: The camera sensor picked up so many more stars than our naked eyes could see!
This image is from a workshop I attended. It is the annual Black Hills Photo Shootout. It was headquartered at the Circle View Ranch on the Cheyenne River just outside Badlands National Park. Native models, dressed in regalia, posed and performed traditional dance routines.
I don't get to attend many workshops but am always looking for new experiences to build my skills.
The best thing I ever did in that regard was join Flickr where international skillsets from talented photographers are on display.
Thank you all for sharing your photos and techniques!
Im not sure if you would even be able to shoot this shot with more water in the river... but I guess a bit more of a flow would work better... you would need gators though as I was standing up to my ankles in water taking this shot... And it would defo be better first thing in the morning... the afternoon light was too much and as you could see I could do nothing but let the sky blow out... I appreciate some people have it in their skillset to blend exposures together and I can do it for a static landscape using the HDR tool in affinity... but it doesnt work for moving water shots... so I just stick to single exposures! I'll give it another go in the future with more water as I liked the composition ... something a little different from the usual Glencoe shots!
The Kaibab Trail begins its studied, winding descent from the South Rim to the inner benches and finally into the depths of the basement rock of the Inner Gorge, Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona.
Down at the bottom of the Canyon, the Trail reaches Phantom Ranch and the Bright Angel campground, and the Park Service has elected to provision these outposts and remove their trash via the only feasible means of transport that doesn’t destroy the peace and quiet - mules. As such, there are sections of the Kaibab Trail that waft something of mule latrine, but it is also true that watching a train of mules sweat to emerge from the Canyon’s bowels is something of a wonder. It strikes me that the art of packing and balancing a load onto mules, and then tying it down properly for a journey is something of a niche skillset these days, and I imagine that for those thus specially trained, obtaining this job at the Park Service and arriving at work in the Canyon every day must be nothing short of miraculous.
Fly Like A Weasel - Juvenile Long-tailed Weasel takes flight with with a To Go(pher) meal In an amazing feat of agility, these young hunter snagged a Botta's Pocket Gopher from it's burrow and switfly dispatched it. This happened so quickly, I wasn't aware. I then noticed this little guy kept picking up and dropping his prey.
I knew I had very little time to act so I positioned myself in the direction he was headed, lay down and fired away nabbing the frame I wanted. Bringing the Nikkor 500 f/4G made all the difference as the Nikkor 200-500 f/5.6 was just too slow to focus last time.
Since I acquired the Nikon D850 last November, it has been a major goal of mine to capture action images with the same level of artistic composition and detail as static portraits. I feel that capturing artistic action images is one of most difficult challenges of wildlife photography, and was one of the holes in my skillset as a photographer. I've invested a lot of time reading up on the Nikon Autofocus system and am slowly starting to develop my skills. I still have long way to go, but achieving this weasel prey jump image was a huge step in the right direction! It is amazing how much technology has advanced in digital photography. Modern equipment allows us to capture images that were simply impossible to capture decades ago during the film days. The only thing holding us back is our imagination and technical understanding
Species: Long-tailed Weasel (Mustela frenata) + Botta's Pocket Gopher (Thomomys bottae)
Equipment: Nikon D850 + Nikkor 500mm f4G ED VR
Settings: 1/3200s, ISO: 400, f/5.0 @500mm, -0.3 EV, Handheld
This little beauty accompanied us through the morning. It first joined us near the entrance of the grassland when we were shooting some birds. And it didn't fly for the next 4 hours. After that I forgot all about it and when I reached home it wasn't there.
Praying Mantis are part of the Mantidae species and are known for predatory behaviors. They stalk prey like smaller insects and even smaller reptiles like frogs or lizards. They are not hard to find, but need to know where they are and how to find them. That is not in my skillset yet - I just enjoy their company.
Thanks in advance for the views and feedback if any.
The Triangulum Galaxy is part of our local group of nearby galaxies. It is ~only~ 2.7 million light years away from us. It is the third largest after our Milky Way and then Andromeda. The Triangulum Galaxy faces us head on so it is not as bright as Andromeda which shines nearly 8 times as bright. I could not make it out in my telescope, only after a long exposure could I see it on my LCD screen.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/4
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
42 x 211" for 2 hours 47 min and 13sec of exposure time.
7 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I did use layer masks to bring out the color in the galaxy without making the stars look like christmas lights. I then using my skillset and relyed on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
Take Flight - Recently I have been challenging myself to fill the gaps in my photography skillset. The biggest weakness for me was my birds in flight technique. Since 2021 I've acquired new equipment and been learning a lot to improve. Very proud of this Brown Pelican image. They fish an urban lake in Northern California in fall/winter when there is an anchovy boom (happens every other year or so).
Any CC is welcome.
Species: Brown Pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis)
Location: Santa Clara County, CA, USA
Equipment: Canon EOS R5 + EF 100-400mm IS II + EF 1.4x TC III
Settings: 1/3200s, ISO: 640, f/8 @560mm, Handheld, Electronic Shutter
Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) in the early morning of January 27, 2023.
The comet was discovered in March 2022 at the Zwicky Transient Facility telescope, thus the ZTF name.
Equipment:
SkyWatcher EQ6-R
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S at f/4
Sony a7RIIIa (unmodified)
ZWO 30mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my back yard - Bortle 3
4 x 121" for 8 minutes and 4 seconds of exposure time.
2 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bias frames
Software:
SharpCap
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
Lightroom
My Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S were mounted on an ADM vixen rail and secured to the SkyWatcher EQ6-R mount. I polar aligned my mount using SharpCap Pro. I struggled with getting guiding going and decided to trust my mount to track accurately. I took 4 121-second exposures and dark, flat, and bias frames. DeepSkyStacker was used to combine all frames, and then I processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32-bit file using Levels. I then made it a 16-bit file and continued to stretch the file in levels and curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to help keep colors accurate. I then used my skillset, including some dodging & burning, and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set and Topaz Denoise to give the image a polished look. I brought it into Lightroom to do final color corrections and add EXIF data. I did not attempt to account for the comet's movement, and you can see the nucleus is elongated.
No one likes to have a lens pointed in their direction when not “camera ready” …and this lad let me know it!
Taken with my bride while rafting the Snake River through Grand Teton National Park, taken from the archives and captured on 05 September of 2024.
Editing this shot makes me realize that it might be time for this old man to learn Photoshop as my current editing skillset did not allow me to bring him out of the shadows without penalty!
My Friday night was spent setting up my scope and targeting the Andromeda Galaxy. It is the furthest object visible to the naked eye as it lies relatively close to us at only ~2.5 million light years from Earth.
Equipment:
SkyWatcher EQ6-R
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
ZWO 30mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my front yard - Bortle 3
36 x 210" for 2 hours, 6 min, and 30 sec exposure time.
5 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bias frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
Lightroom
My Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S were mounted on an ADM vixen rail and secured to the SkyWatcher EQ6-R mount. I polar aligned my mount using SharpCap Pro. The guide scope/camera was attached to the camera's hot shoe. I used PHD2 to autogude during the imaging session. DeepSkyStacker was used to combine all frames, and then I processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32-bit file using Levels. I then made it a 16-bit file and continued to stretch the file in levels and curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to help keep colors accurate. I then used my skillset, including some dodging & burning, and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set and Topaz Denoise to give the image a polished look. I brought it into Lightroom to do final color corrections and add EXIF data.
I imaged the Pleiades about a month ago. I used my 300mm lens. After getting some time on the Dumbbell Nebula, I took off the teleconverter and shot this target again with a longer focal length than I had before. I also used ISO 3200 and f/5.6 to bring out those diffraction spikes, which I think look really cool.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
35 x 90" for 53 min and 5 sec of exposure time.
9 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relyed on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
After a long break from doing astrophotography, I decided to spend some time last night and use the new gear I recently got shooting a popular and relatively easy target, The Pleiades. It does appear the lens was slightly off on focus, but whatever. Most people will never pixel-peep it anyways. It all worked great, and it felt good to capture the heavens again.
Equipment:
SkyWatcher EQ6-R
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
ZWO 30mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my front yard - Bortle 3
68 x 121" for 2 hours, 17 min, and 8 sec exposure time.
10 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bias frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
Lightroom
I polar aligned my mount using SharpCap Pro. My Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S were mounted on an ADM vixen rail and secured to the SkyWatcher EQ6-R mount. The guide scope/camera was attached to the camera's hot shoe. I used PHD2 to autogude during the imaging session. DeepSkyStacker was used to combine all frames, and then I processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32-bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16-bit file and stretched it in levels, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to help keep colors accurate. I then used my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set and Topaz Denoise and Sharpening to give the image a polished look. I brought it into Lightroom to do final color corrections and add EXIF data.
♡ Myla Outfit x Kustom9 event ♡ + GIVEAWAY
♡ Like, Comment and Follow Palette ♡
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Now at Kustom9 is the Myla Outfit!
Hey Cuties!
This time around I have such a cute laidback casual outfit for you guys - I really love overalls and I love making them so I decided to make some new overalls as the last one were so long ago and I've improved my overall skillset (Get it? HA) to make them even BETTER.
I hope you like this set!
♡ T-Shirt: 16 colors || 30 Colors + Fruit Pack + 10 Patterns + mix and match in the Fatpack
♡ Overalls: 16 colors || 30 Colors + 10 Patterns + mix and match in the Fatpack
♡ Boots: 16 colors || 30 Colors + 10 Patterns + mix and match in the Fatpack
♡ Bag: 16 colors || 30 Colors + 10 Patterns + mix and match in the Fatpack
Both PBR and FB are included in the folder.
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♡ Body Sizes:
Reborn / Squishy mod INCLUDED / Legacy / Perky / LaraX
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maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/kustom9/149/14/1003
Here in the northern California high desert we're blessed with some pretty dark nights. Therefore, it just makes sense I start adding nightscapes to my skillset. I went to the lime kiln near where the railroad town of Amedee used to be and had my first go at star trails. The orange glow low in the sky is from the near by community of Wendel California. Overall, I'm pleased for a first effort. I shot a total of 20-3 minute frames and ultimately opted to only use 10 of them as I felt using all of them made the image too busy.
Images taken on March 2, 2021
Mars reflects the sun's light and is ~22 light minutes from Earth. The Pleiades is an open star cluster that is ~ 442 light years away from us. While these two are so different, both of them are prominent and easy to spot in the night sky. It’s very cool to witness the two so close to each other. I knew this was happening, but my life and job have been so busy lately it slipped my mind until it was basically happening already.
Step outside tonight and take a lookup. You can find this event just ahead of the constellation Orion. The next time these two will be near each other in our night sky again in 2038!
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Canon FD 300mm f/4 L at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
10 x 121" for 20 min and 10 sec of exposure time.
10 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Canon FD 300mm f/4 L on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
I have been totally dumbfounded about what to do for this item - comics. ….. Thought about drawing something but I don’t have Patricia Lane Evans’ skillsets. Thought about finding the sunday funnies and taking a picture. Saw this on FB and thought it epitomizes the season and my love for things tie-dyed. If I come up with a better idea, I’ll swap it out.
ANSH scavenger11 comics
I previously imaged the Orion and Running Man Nebulas in November. My exposure was only about an hour. With the new moon last night, I got my gear out and did just shy of three hours on this target.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
80 x 120" for 2 hr 41min and 20 sec of exposure time.
20 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
I got very lucky with this image! I had planned out the morning to catch the eclipse, but I had my dates wrong and only realized my error the evening before as I was settling down for the night, so I didn't get to bed as early as I would have liked to rest up for my morning outing. And, I didn't have my spot fully picked out to catch this once in a lifetime celestial event. Because of this, I set the alarm a bit earlier than I might have otherwise done, which was a good thing (as you'll see as I work my way through this rambling narrative...). An hour and 20min drive to my viewpoint only to find it socked in by the clouds you can see past the ridgeline in this shot and I had a panicky race to my backup viewpoint (which would have been a 20min drive under normal circumstances - I won't say how long it took me to get there that morning...).
I have yet to develop the full skillset when it comes to landscape photography. I couldn't sort out the right settings for shooting into the sun, so I bracketed every composition in hopes that I could exposure blend something together into a solid image. I haven't shared my image from that morning before now because I tried processing my files 3 times before today, but I couldn't get a "final" image that felt both real and looked like how I remembered the morning. Until now.
This may not be perfection in photography, but it captures how I remembered the scene. I shot it a bit wider than images I've seen from other photographers , but I wanted to capture the ethereal mists of the morning as well as the crescent sun. Those same clouds almost blocked the view of the event entirely, but I managed to find a window of opportunity with is image.
I apologize for the rambling description with this image!
#m43ftw #BreakFreeWithOlympus #morning #landscape #misty #sunrise #eclipse #annular #annulareclipse #Letchworth #vista #igersbuffalo #microfourthirdsgallery #DxOPhotoLab #on1pics #on1photos #behindthelens
#ccwelcome
I’ve always felt that black and white photography is more like reading the book than seeing the movie. It leaves something for your imagination to work with rather than being presented with everything all at once. And in life, that’s generally a good thing.
But as a photographer who primarily works in color, I produce very little mono output, largely because it requires a skillset which I don’t really feel comfortable with. In fact, my “mono book” would be more of a children’s novel than a literary classic. But sometimes, it’s good to try something different and the sky on the day I took this shot seemed to work better with no color distraction in it.
I hope that you all have a lovely Easter.
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery.
| facebook | 500px | ferpectshots |
Enough with the woodland photographs, today lets talk about my bread and butter landscape location—the High deserts of the west coast. And today's shot comes from the Smith Rock State Park in Oregon. This is one location that we have visited on every trip to the beautiful beaver state. The rock formation is just absolutely stunning, and along with that, Smith Rock is a prime spot for spectacular sunset or sunrise shots.
The first time we visited the park was in 2013, and I had just updated my gear from a crop sensor D7000 to full-frame D800 along with a brand new 24-70 f2.8, and I was hoping for the image quality to take a jump. The expected increase in image quality did not happen. I had to discard a lot of the images because the 36 megapixels of the D800 demanded better technique than the 16 MP D7000. The 24-70 f2.8 was heavy, and the depth of field was shallower. This made sharp frames a challenge. So all in all, not a great first outing.
But I was ready when we returned the second time. I had time to get familiar with my camera gear, and my technique had improved quite a lot. I got way more keepers on this trip, but there we still a lot of photographs that I had to discard. Then I attended some post-processing & workflow classes and understood the importance of having a good workflow and sound post-processing. Now that I have some time on my hands, I revisited some of my old shots. By far, this has been the best skillset I have added as a photographer. Today's image was a stitched panorama of about five images taken in portrait orientation. The first time I post-processed the picture, it looked way too saturated and artificial that I decided not to post it anywhere. But I liked the composition too much and decided to re-process the image. I am much happier with the result. It is way closer to the actual sunrise we encountered that beautiful summer morning. I hope you all enjoy it as well.
I went back and reshot this, framing it to include both objects, where before NGC 288 was a surprise for me.
I've been wanting to shoot this galaxy for awhile and I pulled out my gear last night to do it finally. It is to the south and pretty low, near the horizon. I have to shoot towards the town of Taos to get this galaxy. I was unaware of the star cluster, NGC 288 before I began shooting last night.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/4
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
47 x 120" for 1 hr 34min and 47 sec of exposure time.
11 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
Easily my favorite place to shoot.
I recently asked a professional photographer, how do I advance my skillset? His reply was to keep returning to the same spots, get to know them. Keep at it.
Shot with the 14mm Samyang manual focus lens.
I saw that Flickr user Henrique J.Silva posted his version of this scene yesterday. I had a good night where I live and I wanted to try my hand at capturing the same scene with similar gear.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-D @ f/2.8
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
43 x 151" for 1hour 5min and 13sec of exposure time.
7 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-D on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I made a layer to overexpose the galaxies a bit and then masked off the Triangulum Galaxy to try to match it to the brighter Andromeda Galaxy. I used dodging and burning to bring out a bit more detail in the galaxies. I then using my skillset and relyed on Astronomy Tools Action Set to give the image the finishing touches.
Found in the sword of the Orion Constellation, the Orion Nebula is visible to the naked eye. It is only 1,500 light years away from us and thus appears very bright. It is worth checking out with a small telescope or even a pair of binoculars.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
47 x 90" for 1 hr 11min and 17 sec of exposure time.
11 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
The Dumbbell Nebula is a planetary nebula and is in the constellation Vulpecula, It’s ~1227 light years away from us. “Plantetary nebubla” is kind of a misnomer because it doesn’t have anything to do with planets, the gasses and colors come from a star that has shed its outer layers. If you squint or zoom in, you can see the white dwarf star in the middle. Charles Messier first noted it in his catalog of objects in the night sky as Messier Object 27 in 1764. The Dumbbell Nebula gets its name from English Astronomer John Herchel, who thought its shape resembled a dumbbell. - You can view this object with a small telescope, or even binoculars.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at +1.4x Teleconverter (700mm) at f/8
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
25 x 180" for 1 hour 15 min and 25 sec of exposure time.
6 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. For this I used a 1.4x teleconverter making the focal length 700mm at f/8. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I did mask the nebula and bring some color out on it, while not adding the color to the stars and deep space. I then using my skillset and relyed on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
- Salvador Dali.
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If you check out my photostream, you will notice that I occasionally dab in macro photography. I have always found it very challenging and especially when shooting bugs as they rarely sit still and getting such razor-thin depth of field is almost impossible at my skillset. This is an old shot I took while we visited one of the gardens nearby. I don’t think I took this shot with the macro lens but with my 24-70mm lens at its widest aperture. I set up my tripod and framed the image with the focus on the flower closest to the camera. Just as I was about to take the image, a breeze came in and pretty much ruined the shot. I was pretty pissed and moved on without waiting to retake the shot. Later while I was going over the images, I really liked the way this image was rendered once I added a bit of contrast and color.
I've been wanting to shoot this galaxy for awhile and I pulled out my gear last night to do it finally. It is to the south and pretty low, near the horizon. I have to shoot towards the town of Taos to get this galaxy. I was unaware of the star cluster, NGC 288 before I began shooting last night.
Equipment:
Celestron CGEM Mount
Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s at f/5.6
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
Altair 60mm Guide scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
35 x 90" for 53 min and 5 sec of exposure time.
10 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bais frames
Guided
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
DeepSkyStacker
Photoshop
My mount was polar aligned with SharpCap (what an amazing system for aligning). I'm not comfortable using my SCT as my lens yet. My solution is to piggyback my Sony a7RIII and adapted Nikkor 500mm f/4 P Ai-s on a ADM dovetail rail on the top of my optical tube. I used DeepSkyStacker to combine all frames and then processed the TIFF file in Photoshop. I stretched the 32 bit file and used Gradient XT on the image. I then made it a 16 bit file and stretched in level, then curves. I used the color sampler tool and levels to do my best to keep the background space black. I then using my skillset and relied on Astronomy Tools Action Set, and dodging and burning a bit to give the image the finishing touches.
This photograph was taken in South Africa on Christmas Day a few years ago.
I've been haemorrhaging photographic motivation for the last few weeks; figured I'd take a break from photography for a few months and focus on some other hobbies/interests to see where they lead :)
Many thanks to everyone who's viewed, faved and commented on my photographs, I appreciate it and will continue to follow your Photostreams with interest.
In addition, thank you for sharing such incredible images; your photography has served as both inspiration and incentive in furnishing me with different perspectives to expand my photographic horizons and skillset.
Happy shooting!
- Ralph Waldo Emerson.
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Keeping with the woodlands there, today’s hot is from another woodland setting. Still from the west coast, but this time from Central California. After moving to California, this was one of the first trails we hiked. It didn’t disappoint, there were a bunch of amazing waterfalls at varying heights, and all of them provided exciting composition possibilities. The trail closely follows the Swanson creeks along the moss-covered Uvas Canyon.
This waterfall is known as the upper falls and is one of the tallest along the trail. The widest focal length at my disposal was 28mm, so I went downstream and framed the falls with the creek bed as the foreground interest.
A bit about equipment, I used a D7000 and an old Nikkor 18-70mm, which I bought off eBay for $65. I used to have the plastic Cokin filter system with a horrible magenta cast. Lees were so expensive me and often had months-long waitlists. Still, while processing the image, I couldn’t differentiate the shot from any that I have taken with D800 or D850 with my 70-200 or 24070 f2.8 pro lenses. Does this mean the expensive gear is a waste of money? No, it doesn’t. I had to be very careful with this equipment. The D7000 was a champ, but the 18-70 was a beaten piece of equipment, and I did not trust its focusing abilities, so manual focusing and taping the focus ring was the norm. The Cokin filters were a literal pain to use. There were countless instances were, its sharp edgest relieved my fingers off the skin. Plus, I had to be ever vigilant of light leaks because the cheap plastic got scratched up quickly and created horrible flares. The D850 and 24-70 f2.8 and breakthrough filters don’t worry me like my older setup. And that’s what expensive equipment gives you, peace of mind and a lesser chance of failure but it does not improve the quality of shots, your skillsets will do that. So don’t get discouraged if you are not using top of the line equipment, it’s the crappy equipment that will develop you as a better photographer.
Screen shot of one of my many characters/classes/professions - in the game Guild Wars 2. "Pinarella" is a Virtuoso (Mesmer core), photo was taken at Kaineng City in the Cantha region. (End of Dragons DLC is needed to acquire location and skillset)
I'll post other characters I have later (mainly to show friends that might be interested)
Have questions about what I am wearing or equipment or any other general GW2 inquiries -- send me an IM.
I know these are not the best pictures of the moon, but I tried again. They are a little better than other attempts, though. This time, I stopped down the exposure as far as I could and shot with iso between 800 and 1600. I only have a 55-250 mm telephoto lens, so I cropped many of these, which took away some of the sharpness.
The fun thing about these pictures, though, is I went down to the beach with my son (past his bedtime, but we're on vacation). He thought it was great fun to try to shoot the night sky with Mom and greatly enjoyed the opportunity to sneak out without his little sister knowing that he was going back to the beach so late at night (really it was only about 9:00 pm). Originally the plan was to attempt to capture the clear starry sky and the glowing, white ocean waves, but that proved way beyond my skillset, so I was completely unsucessful there. Ian and I looked down the beach and noticed that there was a big orange ball in the sky and at first we both did not know what it was. Then Ian said, "Mom, I think that's the moon! It's orange!"
"Should we go back and get the zoon lens?" I asked.
"Yes," he said. "Let's do it!" By the time we got back to the beach with the zoom lens, the moon was less of a large ball in the sky and more like a moon, but it was still orange. I made several attempts to capture it. Ian looked on the lcd screen after each shot and commented when they were not working. On one shot, he told me, "well, that's better, but the moon is a little stretched." I love that kid!
Another new toy to play with - the Rokinon T2.2 cine lense (f2) 12mm. Wide angle photography is a whole different skillset. Wonderfully sharp.
- Pablo Picasso.
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It's been a while since I have posted a macro shot, so I thought that this would be a good time to explore a bit about my adventures in the close-up photography genre. During most of our photo trips, we usually set aside some time to practice my macro photography game. Now I have no shame in admitting the fact that I am not very good at macro photography, but my skillsets have improved a lot since I started. The love for macro shots was there since I got interested in photography and one of the first lenses I purchased was a 70-300 mm sigma lens and the reason why I splurged all of $120 on that lens was because it had a 1:4 reproduction ratio. Now by all other measures, this was a terrible lens. It was sharp but had no image stabilization and was front heavy. It also had some image quality issues but all I cared about was that it had a decent magnification.
Armed with the pseudo macro, I spend a lot of time getting close up shots of insects and wildflowers. It was some of the most fun I have had behind the camera, but the results were not as spectacular as I thought it would be, but I didn’t care. Later, when I had a chance to get hold of an old Nikkor classic macro lens, I jumped at the chance and ended up being the proud owner of a 105mm f2.8 AF-D lens. While the Sigma was a disappointment, the Nikkor was a stunning example of a macro lens. The images were sharp with beautiful rendering throughout. Even the D850’s 46-megapixel sensor was not a problem for this 40-year-old lens.
The Cygnus Loop
50+ hours of integration time. 28 different image panels. 3 years in the making!
Found directly overhear in mid to late summer in midnorthern latitudes, the Cygnus Loop spreads its gassy tendrils across the sky. It can be found in the dusty lanes of the Milky Way just by the wing of Cygnus, the swan, glowing in various parts of the electromagnetic spectrum. The nebula complex is located about 2500 LY from Earth and spans 130LY and contains several named "objects" like the Eastern Veil (Witch's Broom). Pickering's Triangle, and the Western Veil. These gassy wisps are all that remain of a star that went supernova about 21000 years ago, spreading its enriched guts across the galaxy.
The bulk of this project was shot in the summer of 2019. I've now revisited with fresh eyes, new tools, and an improves post processing skillset. I've added more data to it than the original, going back and finding other images I'd previously shot of various parts of the nebula, and integrated them into this new image. This image combines nearly 50 hours of integration time with over 20 individual panels to complete the mosaic. The result is a large 56 Megapixel size image of one of the largest deep sky objects in our night sky.
- TECH DATA -
Scope: Explore Scientific ED80 @ f/6
Mount: Celestron CGX
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI 1600MC-Pro
Filtre: STC Duo-Narrowband
Guide Scope: Orion Mini Guide Scope
Guide Camera: Orion StarShoot Autoguider
Integration time: Unsure - over 50 hours total for the entire pano
Stack: Astro Pixel Processor
Process: PixInsight
Post Processing: Photoshop CC
Shot at Dark Sky Viewing Area near Erinsville, and the Camden Lake Provincial Wildlife Area near Moscow, both in Lennox and Addington County in Eastern Ontario.
- Carl Sagan.
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Today I want to talk a bit about the importance of exploring landscape spots that are close to home. I had a bit of a creative block last year when we moved to Arkansas. Coupled with my wife’s challenging pregnancy and the arrival of the little one, photo trips kind of fell off our priority list. So, I resorted to Going over and cataloging my old shots. This allowed me to take a critical look at what photos worked and what flopped.
While looking at my old shots, I ran into this image, and it’s a seascape that I took on a beach in Malibu. This beach was probably walking or biking distance away from where I lived in LA. But being near some amazing landscape locations meant that these little gems all around us got overlooked. We would often put local exploration in the backburner in favor of a long weekend trip to Big Sur or Joshua Tree NP. While I lived in NH, I did not have access to grandiose vistas like the ones often found on the west coast, but I believe the scarcity of these mega landscapes helped me a lot in developing my skillsets as a nature photographer.
Now Malibu does not exactly lack in beauty, but it’s often busy and crowded, and getting wild landscape shots is a proper challenge. I still remember the day I took this shot; I was thinking of getting some seascape images, and after checking the haze and cloud cover, I realized that we have a rare good day on both fronts. So, we headed out on out checking out some of the beaches that had some rocks in them. I think the tide was supposed to come in by sunset, so I had an excellent chance to get some dreamy surf as well. After a bit of trial and error, we found the perfect beach for the purpose. Because it was somewhat rocky, there were hardly any people on the beach.
Seeing this image bought back a lot of memories and a twinge of disappointment, there were hundreds of spots in LA to explore, and we missed quite a bit of them. Hopefully, I will not repeat the same mistake here at the natural state.
I've photographed this scene several times over the past few years, since getting in to photography. One good upload with each camera, each representative of a different place I was at in my technique and artistic vision.
I took the first one with the Canon Digital Rebel XTi - my first camera. This was 6 years ago, and I'd probably been photographing for less than a year. I had experimented with HDR at this point, and knew enough to shoot multiple exposures anyways just in case, though the camera limited auto bracketing to 3 shots. My processing represents my thought process at the time - the camera severely limited detail at all but the lowest ISOs, so processing is going to require serious creativity to get anything nice looking. Fine detail was completely missing, and there really isn't anything to see at a resolution higher than Flickr's. In better hands than mine, perhaps the camera could have captured this scene more accurately and with more detail. But all things considered, I am extremely happy with what I was able to do with the skillset and tools at my disposal.
Several years later, and the Digital Rebel is replaced with the Nikon D200, and again I return to this scene. Better tools and technique allowed me to capture a dramatically more detailed and less noisy image. I was firmly in the realm of the HDR panorama at this point - three parallel images of 3 exposures each, all processed direct into HDR. The results look really good - but I took a lot of shortcuts along the way. Although the picture looks great at regular viewing, closer inspection reveals problems. Serious issues with edge distortion are noticeable - the result of me not knowing how to warp the panorama nearly as well as I do now. Also noticeable are issues with chromatic abberation, blow-out blacks, and inconsistent noise levels.
The Nikon D200 is a great camera, though. I may be able to re-process this picture in such a way as to eliminate these issues.
Lastly (for now), we have this version, taken with the Nikon D800E. More subtly processed than the others, at least at first glance. In actuality, this one has more layers and more edits than any of the other photos. They are just less obvious, and done more carefully. Still, just like the previous two photos, this still uses HDR data from multiple RAW files, and like my technique with the D200, still is a panorama.
The detail captured with the D800E is incredible though - far more information than either of the previous cameras. And having all of this detail makes me more hesitant to eliminate with large-scale massive vivid edits. Such edits are fine for saving a low quality photo, like with the first shot above, but in a situation where you have perfect dynamic range at the brightest and darkest areas of the image, it would be a waste to destroy that. I want to aspire to do more with my art.
More than anything else, my modern technique is about not taking shortcuts. The warping was done painstakingly to eliminate distortion. Chromatic abberation was corrected, even in places where it wouldn't be visible at web sizes. The entire thing was processed for ultra high resolution - far beyond what Flickr can display. But still - processing for quality causes me to approach the photographs in a different way. And I like the road this approach is leading me on. I still have a lot to learn, but I always have, and I'm enjoying learning it through experience.
- Isaac Bashevis Singer.
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Finally had some time to go over the images taken while we visited the beautiful Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. Our visit coincided with the sandhill crane migration, but we were early for the snow geese. While I thought I was a decent bird photographer, Bosque exposed every single flaw in my technique and skillset in one day.
Its stunning beauty and the sheer number of wildlife quickly overwhelmed my ability to come up with a plan. I had hoped for a bird in flight shot and one of those massive, but rather than picking an area and letting the birds come there, I resorted to driving around and finding birds. Unfortunately, this was the wrong strategy. While we saw tons of birds, we never managed a good spot at any of those locations. The lighting was terrible, or the wind was not in the preferred direction. As a birder, I had a great day bagging so many lifers, but it was a tough day as a bird photog. But the place was so special, even without a solid strategy; I walked away with some beautiful images.
This Barred Owl (Strix varia) is being rehabilitated at the Liberty Nature Center located in Somerset, KY.
This animal was seen at a birding function held in McConnell Springs in Lexington, KY. The animals were being used as an ambassador for training humans the rehabilitation needs of injured birds. This group works with teens to train them in the skillset of working with wild birds.
Two Iron age Verracos from the garden of the excellent history and archaeology museum in the city centre of Cáceres in the Estrémadure region of southern west Spain - so towards the southern limit of the Vettones culture. The head of the top animal is battered from view and the coat is covered with pit marks - a little like the cups of the preceding bronze age, but here perhaps making a pattern of hair or hit marks? The lower example also has elements missing, but is stunning for its sense of mass. The spine is clearly visible. These massive bulls can make some other Verracos look more like cows than bulls...
From around 2400 ybp
The top example "Toro del Hito" is 145 cm. x 75 cm. x 38 cm.
My copy of Photoshop is currently down and my skillset with Photospace X is limited so colour casts may be removed over the days.