Photo Friday: Sand Dune StormPosted by drfl on March 25th, 2011

In keeping with my recent black and white theme, today I present an image from 2008 that I converted to monochrome. It didn’t work well as a color image, but the patterns and contrasts seem to really work in black and white.

Technical Details:
Canon 5D, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm, f/13, .6 seconds, 2-stop Singh-Ray grad filter
Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado

“From the Edge with Peter Lik” Announcement and ContestPosted by admin on March 23rd, 2011

I have been contacted by the Weather Channel to send out a little snippet about the new show featuring landscape photographer Peter Lik.  In an effort to expand the bounds of this blog and subject my audience to a wider range of inspiration, I am also holding a contest to receive a free copy of Peter Lik’s “Spirit of America” book.  In order to enter to win you must simply:

1. “Like” Journey of Light Photography on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/JourneyOfLightPhotography.  If you are already a fan, no worries, this part is complete.

2. “Like” this page by using the Facebook “Like” button below.

3. Sit back and wait until April 17th and catch a couple of episodes of “From the Edge with Peter Lik”.  Or, in Peter’s words “Get off the couch and get out there!”  I will be randomly choosing a Facebook fan by using the tools at random.org.

Note: This contest is only open to my friends in the U.S.  Sorry, it’s not that I don’t like my foreign friends, it’s just that contest rules get tricky outside the U.S. and I, unfortunately, do not have time to interpret them. 

Now for the announcement:

The Weather Channel is launching a new reality TV show, “From the Edge with Peter Lik”, focusing on scenic outdoor photography. The show will follow Peter Lik, an Australian landscape photographer as he travels to places where weather continues to have a unique impact on the landscape. Every week, Lik will attempt to capture the essence of Mother Nature through his lens with his unique perspective, style, and skill. Throughout the thirteen episodes, Peter will photograph stunning landscapes across Hawaii, Alaska, Death Valley, Utah and other hidden gems off the map. We’ll see all his photographs and techniques along the way as he overcomes weather-related obstacles to find “the perfect shot”.

Premiere Date: March 31, 8pm, The Weather Channel, 13 episodes
Homepage: http://weather.com/peterlik
Slideshow (embed code available): http://t.co/gk84hAf
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#!/TWCFromtheEdge
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/TWCFromtheEdge

The fine print:

The information above has been provided by the Weather Channel.  They are directly providing the book in this contest.  I am not affiliated with Peter Lik or the Weather Channel in any way.

This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook. You are providing your information to Journey of Light Photography and not to Facebook. The information you provide will only be used for providing information regarding Journey of Light Photography.  I will not sell, transfer, write on a paper airplane and fly, or otherwise disseminate your information to others.  That causes bad karma.

Photo Friday: A Look at Silver Efex Pro 2 (Mini-Review)Posted by drfl on March 18th, 2011

In addition to my normal Photo Friday image, today I’m going to do a mini-review of Silver Efex Pro 2 by Nik Software.  Having used Silver Efex in the past, I became quite a fan of the engine and options behind the filter.  Besides giving me some granular control over the image, I was able to modify items such as film grain, structure, color filters, and contrast with ease which helped take my black and white conversions to the next level.  Silver Efex Pro 2 takes all of this and adds even more.  All the same stuff is there, but now they have added fine structure, soft contrast, image borders, the ability to amplify both the whites and blacks, and a feature for selective color.  The normal presets are still there with the ability to set your own and export and import them.  This is great because if you develop a “look” and want a team of people to have access, it can be readily available.  One last item to note, the software seems faster to me than the previous version.  While version 1 wasn’t a slouch, I am impressed by how quickly it rendered the output.  The only nit I found was that when changing presents, sometimes I had to click on the image to get it to update.  Not a huge problem, but it was somewhat annoying, initially.

Last week I photographed a duck feather I found with my daughter and I thought it the perfect opportunity to put the software through a test.  Below are some of the looks I created with Silver Efex Pro 2.  Mind you, this is only scratching the surface, but it can create some wildly varied output. See the examples after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Photo Friday: Grass AbstractPosted by drfl on March 11th, 2011

Happy Friday!  Photo Friday today is a black and white abstract of grasses.  While out taking a small walk through the OPPD Arboretum, I came across this grass that had been flattened from a large animal (likely a deer) resting or sleeping on it.  I was drawn to the lines and patterns, the swirls and the contrasts.

Technical Details:
Canon G10, 8.9mm, f/4.5, 1/200 sec.
OPPD Arboretum, Omaha, Nebraska

Photo Friday: Around the TreePosted by drfl on March 4th, 2011

Prairie grass is fascinating to watch, especially when one is standing in miles of it.  Acting as one connected organism, groups of prairie grass move and sway in unison with even the smallest of breezes.  A quiet rustling accompanies the movement, gentle, calming.  On the prairie one can find peace and solitude with miles of nothing and nobody.  The vastness is engulfing and liberating, making one feel both small and large simultaneously.  It is endless and eternity.

Technical Details:
Canon 5D Mark II, 300 f/4l + 1.4tc, f/9, 1/60 sec.
Chalco Hills Recreation Area, Nebraska