Sunday, February 8, 2009

I am Speechless

OMG, OK, now I am speechless. Now I know how those beautiful images were created, some of them at least.

Painted archway leading to the wetland


Part II of my HDR study. I drove to Alviso, a rather charming old town 20 minutes north of San Jose proper this morning. A friend told me of the town and the weathered buildings, salt mines and cannery. There is also a tiny creek that drains 5 miles into south San Francisco Bay. I arrived around 8:15am as the sun was breaking through the dark clouds (rain expected later in the day). At the wetland were archways painted in light yellow and wooden pathways leading to each of the wildlife viewing platforms. It was magnificently beautiful, simple, yet, to a photographer, it was heaven. I had gone on an HDR mission, and so with the camera on the tripod, I shot a series of bracketed exposures and below are the toned mapped HDR images: I am blown away by what the software does to combine the tonal spectrum...... I am still in shock. Needless to say, I am sold on Photomatix, and will pay up ($99) to get the license so I can create my HDR without the Photomatix watermark and add my own watermark.

All 6 images were toned mapped using Photomatix, with little or no adjustment, all shot with camera on tripod, bracketed exposure and camera set for three consecutive shots with one single shutter click

Twigs in a small creek, Alviso marina


Painted building facade, Alviso, CA


Red brick building facade, Alvisio, CA


wild mustard field, Milpitas,CA



wild mustard flowers, Milpitas, CA



2 comments:

  1. Great work! Btw, it is possible to get a discount on the purchase of Photomatix Pro. If you're a NAPP member (National Assn. of Photoshop Professionsls), you're eligible for a 25% discount. If you're not a NAPP member, go for the discount from Ben Willmore's Digital Mastery site (15%):

    http://whereisben.blogs.com/whereisben/dicounts.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. First one is simply amazing photo. And the mustard field!

    Congrats on the photomatix! I can't seem to achieve same results in photoshop..

    ReplyDelete